It took KwaZulu-Natal, and in particular Lance Klusener, only 14 overs to wrap up Western Province's second innings at Newlands. From their overnight score of 260 for 6, Province looked set to establish a big lead, but thanks to Klusener, who took the final three wickets, Natal managed to keep their target down to 346. The stalwart of the innings, JP Duminy, could not add to his overnight score of 89 when he was caught behind off Nixon McLean. With Klusener wrapping up the tail he pushed his match haul to 12 wickets.
Losing Doug Watson in the first over did not deter Imran Khan, who was batting as a makeshift opener. At the close he had moved past his highest first-class score, and together with Hashim Amla they batted for nearly four hours, taking Natal to 127 for 1 when bad light stopped play with 22.4 overs still to be bowled.
The Gauteng second stringers surprised all today at Benoni. They firstly avoided the follow-on, and then took two late wickets to leave Easterns leading by 141 with eight second-innings wickets standing. Rory Coutts, on his debut, was mainly responsible for holding the Gauteng innings together. He scored 77 while Jacob Malao took 5 for 82 with his slow left-arm spinners.
Eastern Province were bowled out for 432, adding only five more runs to their overnight total at Boland Park. Wade Wingfield scored all five of those runs to end on 146 not out. Boland's response came in bumps and starts, but Warren Swan, on his debut, kept the middle order together scoring an undefeated 65 after Mark Sanders had been run out for 87. Geoff Love eased his way closer to 150 first-class wickets, taking 5 for 92 with his offbreaks as Boland were bowled out for 324. Eastern Province will start their second innings with a 108-run lead.