Dimuth Karunaratne continued his good form with the bat as he made his way to an unbeaten 49 on day one of the 3 day warm up match between the New Zealand President’s XI and Sri Lanka.
On the back of his innings the Lankan’s finished the day on 97 for the loss of 5 wickets.
Just over half a day’s play was lost as the rains persisted through the morning and early afternoon in Queenstown. When the rains finally cleared up, the NZ President’s Xi skipper Ryan McCone won the toss and put the visitors in to bat.
This was an important juncture for the Sri Lankans who had 3 young players in Kusal Mendis, Udara Jayasundera and Kithruwan Vithanage vying for the opening and number 3 slots vacated by the omission of Kaushal Silva and the retirement of Kumar Sangakkara. Youngster Mendis, who slotted in at number 3 in the recent series against West Indies, was sent in alongside Karunaratne to open the batting. The pair managed to see off the early pace onslaught by Neil Wagner and McCone, albeit scoring at a snail’s pace. Mendis however, fell in the 11th over, making way for Jayasundera. Although the scoring rate did not improve, Jayasundera and Karunaratne put on an important 56 run partnership to steady the innings and bring the team to the brink of the end of the day’s play. Off spinner Tim Johnston, coming in as a 6th bowling option, picked up the crucial wicket of Jayasundera in the 32nd over and Vithanage followed soon after as Sri Lanka lost 4 wickets for 8 runs in 6 overs. Dinesh Chandimal went for a first ball duck and Skipper Angelo Mathews was dismissed for 1. On survival mode, Milinda Siriwardene and Karunaratne made it to the end of the day’s play unscathed.
Johnston turned out to be the chief destroyer for the President’s XI as he picked up Jayasundera, Vithanage and Chandimal to leave the Sri Lankan innings in a dire state. Test hopeful Neil Wagner picked up the 1st and the last wickets of the day to finish with 2 for 23.
Karunaratne, who made a career defining 152 in last year’s tour of New Zealand, will look to capitalize on his start and help Sri Lanka to a competitive 1st innings total. With only one recognized batsman in Kusal Perera to come, Siriwardene and Karunaratne will have to do the bulk of the rebuilding during tomorrows play.
Sri Lanka: 97/5 (40) (Dimuth Karunaratne 49, Udara Jayasundera 21, Tim Johnston 3/9, Neil Wagner 2/23)
