For the current Test series, Sri Lanka approached former England batter Ian Bell to work as Batting Coach and he has been with the team for a week now and despite the poor show by the top order, Bell was impressed by the courage shown and expected the batters to improve as the series went on.
Sri Lanka finished day three with a lead of 82 runs with six wickets in hand. Rain is expected over the next two days and it remains to be seen whether the tourists are able to draw the game.
“Firstly, with the bat we have seen lot of courage and the team has dug in. It wasn’t a great start in both innings. You expect that in England against a quality attack. We want to improve on our first hour’s batting. The courage the middle order and lower order showed was outstanding.”
Sri Lanka were 95 for four at one stage, but a 78 run partnership between Angelo Mathews and Kamindu Mendis ensured that they didn’t collapse and ended the day on 204 for six.
“Important to have a balance between youth and experience. Angelo was superb today. That’s what we want to see from seniors. Obviously as the series goes on that confidence will get better.”
The partnership was threatening and then the ball was changed. Suddenly the new ball started moving around again making batting difficult. Both Mathews and Kamindu were dropped and the partnership was eventually broken when Mathews attempted to work the ball to the mid-wicket but ended up getting a leading edge and was caught at point.
“Ball change you expect that it can happen. All what you want is consistency for both teams. I know we tried to change it couple of times in the first innings. The seam looked pretty awful on that last ball. You have to accept that in these conditions. The ball change can swing around. The lights did come on. Clouds rolled over and that’s the beauty of playing in England. You have to adapt to conditions. It’s unfortunate but the team is in good spirits. I don’t think we worried too much about it and started moaning. We need to put many runs on the board as possible to put England under pressure.”
One reason why Sri Lanka have struggled to post a big totals was opening batter Dimuth Karunaratne hasn’t got going. Usually when Dimuth scores big, Sri Lanka produce big totals.
Karunaratne has come on three Test tours to England and after six Tests has posted only one half-century. “When you look back at the two dismissals in this Test match, he was unlucky. You need to have good intent. Sanath and myself we are trying make a positive environment. I don’t think you want to come here against this England team and particularly try to survive. We want to balance that. Have good defense and if they bowl in our areas we want to encourage guys to be positive.”
Dinesh Chandimal copped a nasty one on his thumb from Mark Wood and had to be taken for hospital. But the scans showed no fracture and the wicketkeeper continued to bat and was unbeaten on 20 at close.
“Good result on the scan. There was some pain killers for Chandimal and he was brave. They are desperate to show people how much it means to play for Sri Lanka. You want that from players. You saw that in the amount of balls tail enders faced in the first innings. They have to wear a few bruises if they want to get anything out of the series.
“Sri Lanka is a team that I have admired so much. To know the players and working with them is great. I am enjoying every minute of spending time in the Sri Lankan dressing room. The passion in the Sri Lankan dressing room for Test cricket is great and they want more of it.”
