The Proteas duly wrapped up the ODI series by winning the third of five matches by nine wickets in East London on Wednesday.
Hashim Amla once again led the way with an unbeaten 61, his 27th one-day international fifty which brought to 280 the runs he has scored in this series. He was well backed up by Faf du Plessis who ended on 51. They reached the disappointing target of 123 with 25 overs to spare and are in the sort of form to take series 5-0.
Earlier, Rilee Rossouw came back down to earth after his maiden ton on Sunday when he mistimed a delivery from Jason Holder and sent it skywards; a shot that left him fuming and frustrated. It should have been two wickets down, but there was almost an inevitability when Jerome Taylor dropped a soaring pull from Du Plessis when he was on 39. He had an earlier let-off, too, when Sulieman Benn dropped him at mid-on when on 31.
But that was as good as it got for the woeful Windies, who surrendered so tamely it took the gloss off the Proteas performances. Still, they can only play what’s in front of them. And they did that efficiently.
The Windies struggled to 122 in 33.4 overs, but while we can admire the work of the bowlers, the West Indians will look back on a few performances which were disappointing, or downright poor. And none more so than Chris Gayle (1) who played a lazy drive off the fifth ball he faced, from Philander. It was full and slightly wide and edged to De Villiers. That was two down for six, after Dwayne Smith had gone in a similar fashion. But at least he was trying to defend.
Narsingh Deonarine and Marlon Samuels put on 27 before Deonarine was caught by De Villiers after he had thick-edged a Steyn delivery to to slip, where Amla parried it into the hands of his keeper. Steyn struck again to dismiss Denesh Ramdin for one and the West Indies were in serious trouble at 43-4.
Marlon Samuels looked determined, scoring 26, when a reckless slog off Imran Tahir ended at Rossouw at long-off, and that sealed their fate.
The highlights of the subsequent sorry procession were when Andre Russell took 10 runs off three balls from Steyn, and when Sulieman Benn sublimely drove Philander over long-on for a soaring six. Otherwise there was not much in it.
Tahir added another three wickets to his averages, getting Jonathan Carter for 18, Carlos Brathwaite (4) and Benn (18) to end with four for 28. Philander had 3-27, earning him the man of the match award, and Steyn 2-21.
Morkel was gifted the wicket of Russell, who looked set until he played badly across the line and was bowled.
