The Australia vice-captain gained one place to share the ninth spot with New Zealand’s Ross Taylor, while Marsh, who struck the first century for Australia on the Sri Lanka tour in Colombo, has jumped 13 places to reach the 33rd rank.
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Herath, who had claimed six wickets in the first innings, then ran through the middle and lower order as the visitors’ batsmen had no answer to his left-arm spin.
Off-spinner Nathan Lyon claimed four for 123, the first of which was thanks to a weird stumping from Australia wicketkeeper Peter Nevill to dismiss Dimuth Karunaratne.
In the Galle Test, he picked up six wickets but it was in the third Test in Colombo where he picked up match figures of 13/145 to give Sri Lanka their first series win against Australia after 17 years.
While Dhananjaya de Silva and Dinesh Chandimal rescued Sri Lanka from a dire situation in the first innings, it was Kaushal Silva’s battling hundred despite suffering an injury that took the game beyond the Australians in the second innings.
Marsh, who was drafted into the Australia side because of his long experience of Asian conditions, survived a dropped catch on 67 early in the morning against Herath but soon took control.
The comprehensive win was sealed late in the second session on the final day when Nathan Lyon was lbw to Rangana Herath and, with it, Australia lost their No.1 Test ranking.
He faced 74 balls and hit 10 boundaries to increase the scoring rate. He was just landing the ball on one leg and he is unbelievable.
“Experience counts a lot, every day we learn”, Herath said as he accepted his man of the match award.
Australia wasted a brilliant base on Monday when in reply to Sri Lanka’s 355, sinking from 1-267 midway through day three to be rolled for 379.
Herath was named man of the match and man of the series.
“I haven’t decided anything on Tests, we will go series by series”.
Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) chief Thilanga Sumathipala said the victory wll have a “huge impact” on the entire cricket-crazy nation of 21 million people as he thanked Australia for touring the island nation.
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Starc was able to hold his head high after taking a remarkable 24 wickets at an average of 15.16.
