As the day four of the second Test came to a close on Sunday, Pakistan is on course to register a famous victory over Sri Lanka here at the National Stadium.
Sri Lanka ended day four at 212/7, and still, 264 runs away from the target.
Chasing 496, Sri Lanka found itself in a spot of bother at 97/5 as their top five batters all failed to leave a mark.
Dimuth Karunaratne (16), Kusal Mendis (0), Angelo Mathews (19), Dinesh Chandimal (2) and Dananjaya de Silva (0) failed to impress with the bat.
Only, Oshada Fernando was able to show fight with the bat in his hand and went on to register a half-century. He found support in Niroshan Dickwella and the duo put on 104 runs for the sixth wicket.
With Sri Lanka at 201, the side lost its sixth wicket as Haris Sohail clean bowled Dickwella (65) in the 58th over of the innings. Soon after, Kusal Perera was also sent back to the pavilion by Naseem Shah, leaving Sri Lanka at 212/7.
Resuming day four at 395/2, Pakistan's overnight batters Azhar Ali and Babar Azam piled on the misery on Sri Lanka's bowlers and their partnership saw skipper Ali going past the 100-run mark.
Sri Lanka finally got the breakthrough in the 124th over as Lasith Embuldeniya dismissed Ali (118).
However, Azam went on to score a century and by this, Pakistan became the second team in the history of Test cricket where top-four batsmen all scored centuries.
Pakistan finally declared their innings at 555/3 and set Sri Lanka 476 runs for the win.
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