Rex Clementine at Old Trafford
Sri Lanka were down and out in the opening Test match against England after they opted to bat first and took lunch on 80 for five. They further slumped to 113 for seven and England looked set to wrap things up for 130 or so. Batting collapses are far too familiar for Sri Lanka in recent years. True the top order folded away. At least the lower order ensured that it wasn’t total surrender.
Captain Dhananjaya de Silva found a superb ally in debutant Milan Ratnayake. The 28-year-old was cock-a-hoop after receiving his Test cap from the nation’s best batsman Kumar Sangakkara. Too many batters had thrown away their wickets and Ratnayake showed application.
“I couldn’t sleep last night. Then this morning to receive the first Test cap from Kumar Sangakkara was like a dream come true. The plan was simple. We wanted to bat as deep as we could leaving as many deliveries as possible and we are happy with what we achieved at stumps,” Ratnayake told journalists.
The partnership between de Silva and Ratnayake was worth 63 runs. Dhananjaya played superbly. Initially he was farming the strike off his partner but once he realized that the man on debut was no mug with the bat, he let him face the music too.
Dhananjaya was eventually caught down the leg side off Shoaib Bashir for a top score of 74 in what is his first Test match in England. That stand took the Sri Lankan score towards 200 mark and then the 50 run partnership between Ratnayake and Vishwa Fernando ensured that Sri Lanka had 236 on board.
Ratnayake faced 135 balls for his 72 and hit six fours and two sixes. Rest of the batters had they shown the same application Sri Lanka could have hoped of scoring in excess of 300. Barring Kusal Mendis and Dinesh Chandimal the rest of the batters either threw it away or were soft dismissals.
Old Trafford wasn’t the easiest pitch to bat on. It was overcast and gloomy and while the quicks swung the ball to deadly effect, one delivery from Bashir that accounted for Chandimal kept low. That’s the type of pitch you expect in the first session of a Test match in Delhi or Galle not at Old Trafford or Edgbaston.
Sri Lanka would be grateful to Ratnayake for enabling them to get to 236. They are still not out of the woods, but the bowlers at least have something to bowl at.
Sri Lanka first innings
Nishan Madushka c Root b Woakes 04
Dimuth Karunaratne c Smith b Atkinson 02
Kusal Mendis c Brook b Wood 24
Angelo Mathews lbw b Woakes 0
Dinesh Chandimal lbw b Bashir 17
Dhananjaya de Silva c Lawrence b Bashir 74
Kamindu Mendis c Smith b Woakes 12
Prabath Jayasuriya c Smith b Atkinson 10
Milan Ratnayake c Woakes b Bashir 72
Vishwa Fernando run out 13
Asitha Fernando not out 0
Extras: (b 4, w 3, nb 1) 8
Total: all out 236
Overs: 74
Fall of wickets: 1-6 (Madushaka), 2-6 (Karunaratne), 3-6 (Mathews),4-40 (Kusal) 5-72 (Chandimal), 6-92 (Kamindu), 7-113 (Jayasuriya), 8-176 (de Silva), 9-226 (Ratnayake), 10-236 (Vishwa).
Bowling: Chris Woakes 11-3-32-3, Gus Atkinson 16-3-49-2 (w 3) (nb 1), Matthew Potts 9-0-48-0, Mark Wood 8-0-31-1, Shoaib Bashir 23-4-55-3, Joe Root 7-2-18-0.
England first innings
Ben Duckett not out 13
Dan Lawrence not out 9
Extras: 0
Total: (for now loss) 22
To bat: Ollie Pope, Joe Root, Harry Brook, Jamie Smith, Chris Woakes, Gus Atkinson, Matthew Potts, Mark Wood and Shoaib Bashir.
Overs: 4
Bowling: Dhananjaya de Silva 2-0-14-0, Prabath Jayasuriya 2-0-8-0.