England v Sri Lanka, 2nd Test: Day 3 - Finally Sri Lanka show that there is not much wrong with the pitch or the conditions

 

England v Sri Lanka

2^nd Test: Day 3

Finally Sri Lanka show that there is not much wrong with the pitch or the conditions

 

May 29^th  2016

 

No time to write today, but this was the day that cricket fans had been waiting for. Despite losing their last two 1^st innings wickets within 4 overs in the morning and losing a wicket early after the follow-on was inevitably enforced, Sri Lanka have done England a favour by giving them a really hard work out and showing that there was nothing wrong with the pitch whatsoever. Whinging about greentops (on which England scored 500 batting first) can end.

Interesting items to come out of the day’s play include the suggestion that maybe Chris Woakes could retain his place when Ben Stokes is fit, with a very off-colour Steve Finn potentially making way. And Moeen Ali discovering that life is not as easy as he had been having it so far: series figures of 5-4-2-1 taking a massive dent as the Sri Lankans targeted him. With Somerset’s Jack Leach (a genuine batting ferret) and Simon Kerrigan at Lancashire showing some decent form, there are some options appearing. As both Leach and Kerrigan are Slow Left Arm, you could even make a case to play Moeen with one or other, giving England a genuinely balanced attack, while retaining three quality seamers.

 

England v Sri Lanka, 2nd Test: Day 2 - Abject Sri Lankan Surrender

 

England v Sri Lanka

2^nd Test: Day 2

Abject Sri Lankan Surrender

 

May 28^th  2016

 

Not everything has gone right for England in this series. Today though they put in as complete a performance as we have seen in recent years. It has to be said that Sri Lanka’s surrender, on a pitch that allowed Steve Finn to bat, once again, in some comfort, was as abject as anything served up by Bangladesh or Zimbabwe at their worst. The tone was set in the first half hour with two bad misses in the field, one of them so awful that it led to the wicket-keeper being substituted. It continued with Moeen Ali passing 50 for just the second time since the end of last summer before setting out to flay the bowling to all corners and ended at 91-8 on a blameless surface in decent batting conditions.

The good news: Sri Lanka have already lasted longer than in either innings in the 1^st Test. Yes, all of 40 overs.

Once again there will be accusations that England have ambushed Sri Lanka with an uncut pitch that was as green, or even greener than the outfield. It was not. Three of England’s players under most pressure for not performing with the bat – Hales, Moeen and Woakes – were able to either score a Test best (Moeen and Woakes) or, in Hales’s case, show that his previous innings was not a fluke although he just missed out on a Test best. During the England innings there was something for the bowler who bent his back and made a real effort, the odd ball did something, but it was by no means a difficult track to score on. Moeen defended to 50 and then cut loose. Woakes, for the first time, looked like a genuine Test batsman – he has nine First Class centuries and a FC batting average of 36.7 – and Sri Lanka seemed to lose all interest.

At the start of play the target was 400 and that looked complicated: an early wicket and 380 would have been difficult. England said that they wanted 450 (not too many fans would have felt that realistic), but the Moeen show pushed things up to almost 500 when Alistair Cook decided to declare. Yes, 500 in well under 5 sessions and England were being accused by some feed-backers of being defensive and boring.

This time with a good batting pitch, good overhead conditions and a stronger batting line-up, you felt that someone would make a decent score and that Sri Lanka could not possibly  fold cheaply twice. There was no sense of an imminent wicket with every ball. Despite the ritual fall of a Sri Lankan opener early, at 44-1, with Anderson and Broad having each bowled six overs and coming to the end of their opening bursts, the scoreboard moving along and two batsman getting set, this had to be the day when Sri Lanka closed at no worse than 120-3, with the prospect of rain on the fourth day to help out. The luckless Nick Compton had just missed a difficult but, by no means impossible, catch. Things were looking good for the batsmen. Last ball of the twelfth over. Knick. Dying on Jonny Bairstow who swoops and scoops. The batsman stands his ground.

Everything then moves into that pause when innumerable replays are shown from multiple angles, none of them suitable for the job. The batsman knows that if he stands his ground the Third Umpire will inevitably find an angle which the foreshortening and the elevation of the camera will make appear that the ball has bounced or, at least, offer sufficient doubt that a clean catch appears uncertain. It is a standard issue with modern technology: it almost always makes low catches look doubtful. It is a simple physics problem: the front view with a somewhat elevated camera to see over the bowler and umpire means that the ball is moving almost directly away from the camera; there is no horizon reference, there is no depth to the image, we cannot see if the ball has changed direction (i.e. has bounced) and although high-resolution TV has improved things, the resolution of the image when zoomed is never quite high enough or, said another way, the image is never quite sharp enough. It is almost impossible to tell where the ball has bounced because the brain has insufficient information to give a complete trajectory solution.

It is also a problem that could be resolved, or almost resolved, at least for catches behind the wicket by having a camera at a low level, positioned square-on about 20 metres behind the stumps, so that it will be in line with the wicket-keeper or slips. If that is too complicated, a back-facing stumpcam at no more than half stump height and preferably a quarter stump height (the lower, the better) will offer the proper perspective and, at least, give the Third Umpire better data to work with.

The batsman knows that the longer that the Third Umpire is looking at the images, the more replays that are called for, the better the chance that he will get away with it.

This was one of the occasions though when a long delay was just a measure of the Third Umpire going through the process with care. He had to see clear evidence that the ball had bounced. Listeners can hear the dialogue between Umpire and Third Umpire: “first check the front foot” – it was fine… not a No Ball. Then the conversation over the actual catch. The Third Umpire asks for the images to be zoomed. Increasing confidence that it looks clean. Finally, the confirmation: “you can give that Out” and the wave of opprobrium in the Internet from hundreds of fans who saw that the ball had “clearly bounced first”. Yes, it was close, but the first impression of the Umpire and most commentators seeing it live was that the catch was clean.

The breech was made. In came the injured Chandimal who had been substituted having not even moved for the ball when Woakes had offered a gentle dolly to the ‘keeper earlier. Chandimal’s day got no better and Jimmy Anderson could take a rest with figures of 9-1-30-2.

Matthews and Mendis together, the one partnership that you could imagine putting on 150 together. On came Woakes, fresh from 9-37 in the County Championship, with a Test bowling average of 63. First over, good, but with no hint of the drama to come. Second over, a wild swing from Matthews before a not very thin edge (with a loud noise) through to Bairstow. One can only imagine that Matthews, a fine, brave player, is starting to crack under the pressure because he must have been the only one on the ground doubting the edge. Cue the jokes that Shane Watson is the Sri Lankan review coach. Suddenly 44-1 is 58-4 and Sri Lanka are wobbling. A couple of overs of peace, a Steve Finn over that neither threatens the batsman nor the Square Leg Umpire and Chris Woakes comes in for his fourth over. Double-wicket maiden. Mendis and the extra batsman, Siriwardena out, 67-6 and the innings all over bar the shouting.

Even then Sri Lanka appeared to be putting things in their proper context as the adhesive Thirimanne and Herath appeared to be moving calmly to the Close, with England relaxing somewhat. Woakes came off guarding figures of 7-4-9-3 and on came Moeen, adding to his solitary over in the series so far. Four straight maidens and his series figures are now 5-4-2-1. Moeen seems to enjoy playing Sri Lanka in May. Back came Anderson to join Broad with nothing much happening. Penultimate over of the day. Longest Sri Lankan stand of the series. Both sides playing for the Close. And, from nowhere, Broad takes two wickets, the first a standard edge to Anderson, the second a remarkable double-play, with Vince palming a screaming edge into the air for Joe Root to dive and take the re-bound one-handed inches from the turf.

91-8 at the Close and enforcing the follow-on in the first half hour of the morning looks to be a no-brainer. So far, in three innings, Sri Lanka have not lasted a total of 4 sessions. The likelihood is that the match will end tonight unless Sri Lanka find some spirit of resistance from somewhere.

England v Sri Lanka, 2nd Test: Day 1 - Glass Half Full Again

 

England v Sri Lanka

2^nd Test: Day 1

Glass Half Full Again

 

May 27^th  2016

 

What does one make of 310-6? The pundits were amazed that England batted in the morning rather than waiting until around Tea to bat and, for large parts of the day, the bat dominated the ball, with the Sri Lankans wondering where a wicket might come from. Yet England were again indebted to Alex Hales for anchoring the innings. He is likely to finish with the top score, unless Moeen shows the sort of form that he has shown for Worcestershire his season and the tail hangs around tomorrow.

With the exception of the struggling Nick Compton, everyone got in and then got out, but no one went on to make it count. Hales reached the 80s again, but again fell to an attacking shot when the century was there for the taking. Sri Lanka brought on a part-time spinner, desperate for a wicket. One ball sailed into the stands and then, the next, Hales tried to repeat the dose. The consolation is that four of the wickets fell to superb catches: if a fly had dared to pass through the slips, one of the Sri Lankans would have bagged it and that, despite playing in, what for them were inhumanly cold conditions. Root looked set for a century but ballooned a pull. Vince fell to the sort of stunning acrobatics that Gordon Banks used to be famous for, Jonny Bairstow demonstrated that he is human and Nick Compton really did not need to see his shot go to hand and stick. Something that has caught the attention is that Root seemed to be fooled by some uneven bounce. Various players got into a tangle trying to play outside off or to pull, strokes that demand reliable bounce (and judgement) suggesting that, although the surface looks full of runs, batting last may get interesting (a euphemism).

Poor Nick Compton. 109 runs at 15.7 this season, with a highest score of 44. He was, along with Alec Hales, a marginal pick but, while Hales has almost certainly sealed his place for the whole summer with two near-centuries, Nick Compton knows that he is depending on charity. If England win and if Compton does not get a second innings and a score, the selectors will have two choices: stick with him for the last match of the series and then (almost certainly) drop him barring a miraculous turn to form, or give his replacement a game to bed-in in a series won before the sterner test against Pakistan. With 634 runs in 8 innings at 90.6 Sam Robson is demanding a recall and you feel that one more score against Hampshire in the match starting on Sunday and he will have to be considered, although Scott Borthwick will know that he is a natural #3 in good form who has Test wickets to his name and would be a slightly left field pick: even so, runs at 51.3 with 2x100 and 1x50 in nine innings demands a second look.

As at Headingley, Sri Lanka’s bowling did not quite get it right initially, but the attack seemed to take wickets despite itself even though the hero of the first day at Headingley has been sacrificed to strengthen the batting. While many pundits took it as read that Sri Lanka would have been bowled out cheaply had England inserted them, the batting looks stronger in this Test and the batsmen have the experience of the first Test to draw on. Do not be surprised if they put up sterner resistance this time.

For England, tomorrow morning is about pushing the total up to or over 400. Moeen Ali, Chris Woakes and Stuart Broad have to sell their wickets dearly. Moeen needs a score to silence the whispers that are wondering if Lancashire's good start and 14 wickets at 29.7 means that it is time to have another look at Simon Kerrigan. He has been moved up a position to #7 to give him a chance to play a major innings. Chris Woakes needs to stay with him and go well past his Test best of 26*.

310-6 is not a disaster, but the score at the Close could, so easily, have been 330-3, with Sri Lanka batted almost out of the match.

England v Sri Lanka, 1st Test: Day 3, England’s Flawed Win

 

England v Sri Lanka

1^st Test: Day 3

England’s Flawed Win

 

May 22^nd  2016

 

When people look at the scorecard in ten years’ time, they will think that this was a facile victory of a very good side against a very poor one on a difficult pitch. In doing so they will give England far too much credit.

The pitch was by no means difficult. In fact, the TMS commentators pointed out time and again that the pitch was an excellent Test surface. There was some lateral movement, but the damage was done by the atmospheric conditions and the murky light: ideal for swing bowling. Herath could turn the ball. Moeen Ali only got one over in the match and took the wicket of Chandimal – no rabbit with the bat. And England had an attack in the second innings missing the injured Ben Stokes and with Steve Finn looking totally ineffective.

England’s score of 298 depended on two players: Jonny Bairstow, the only player to bat with real liberty and the battling Alex Hales. The England collapse was made more alarming by the way that most of the batsmen got themselves out – there were very few who can say that a bowler genuinely took his wicket. However, Steve Finn – the Watford Wall – and a genuinely number 11, got in and was able bat comfortably for well over an hour, often taking 4 and even 5 balls in an over. If Steve Finn can get in and play some good shots, it was far from an impossible surface to bat on!

Nick Compton needed runs and did not get them. He was one of the few to get a really good ball. Vince did not convince: he looked quite comfortable, but got himself out in single figures. Ben Stokes played WHACK! WHACK! OUT! And Moeen Ali, who has been in delicious batting form for Worcestershire, never looked like scoring a run. Add a duck for Root and a failure for Alistair Cook and the batting has little to be proud of.

Some of the Sri Lankan batting looked overawed. England had no one bowling at close to 90mph, but the tail-enders were backing away to Square Leg and appeared plain scared. However, at one point it looked as if England would have to bat again and you wondered where the next wicket might come from: Jimmy Anderson had to rest some time, Stuart Broad could not reproduce his first innings magic, Ben Stokes has a knee problem that may need an operation and poor Steve Finn looked as if he were a Middlesex 2^nd XI player given a surprise call-up in an injury crisis.

Stokes must be an unlikely starter for his home Test with Chris Woakes favourite to replace him. Woakes for Stokes sounds as if it is like-for-like, but it is a bit like replacing Bruce Willis in an action movie with Leslie Nielson… it is not quite the same level of action. Meanwhile, Jake Ball will be telling his wife not to expect him home on Friday night: there are good reasons for playing him instead of Finn at Chester-le-Street. Finn had batted well and took two superb catches in the first innings, but his job is to bowl fast and take wickets. Until his late burst in the final collapse as Sri Lanka fell from 93-3 to 119ao, he looked unlikely to take a wicket. Finn’s self-confidence will have been done no harm by seeing Herath scared to face him after being hit and then by taking Thirimanne, who batted so well in the first innings and who will surely score some big runs by the end of the series, but unless Steve Finn is to bowl fast and threatening at Chester-le-Street, it is best to pick a specialist seam and swing merchant instead. Finn’s county form has not be great either, part of what has been a curiously off-colour Middlesex attack so far this season.

So, it was job done and job done big time, but the conspiracy theorists are already seeing evidence of foul play and suggesting that Sri Lanka were sacrificed on a pitch the same colour as the outfield. If they had asked instead why the first two Tests are going to the north of England in May, they might have been closer to the mark. England though, apart from Alex Hales showing that he is up to the job of grafting runs and Jimmy Anderson showing that he is so much better for playing some matches for his county before playing a Test, the result has been curiously unsatisfying.

England v Sri Lanka, 1st Test: Days 1 & 2: England Make a Small Piece of History with the Follow-On

 

England v Sri Lanka

1^st Test: Days 1 & 2

England Make a Small Piece of History with the Follow-On

 

May 20^th  2016

 

Two years ago Sri Lanka came as whipping-boys to put a shell-shocked England team with a re-styled side including Sam Robson and Moeen Ali back on the road to recovery. The cynics said that a heavy win over Sri Lanka would just hide England’s problems. Of course, the result of a bad-tempered series, in which England showed their uglier face, was a humiliating defeat, despite the heroics of Moeen Ali and Jimmy Anderson who were two balls from rescuing a quite incredible draw.

In many ways the 2014 Sri Lanka series was a low point – although things did get even worse before getting better – and was to England’s long-term benefit. Since then, the side and its management have been renovated, the style of play has brightened and England are less disposed to make enemies both on and off the pitch. And this time Sri Lanka have come back, welcome visitors as always, to talk of cricket with an edge, which is what it should have, but without degenerating into ugliness.

As always, when they visit in May, Sri Lanka have to compete with the IPL for players and several of their big stars are now retired. The result has been two warm-up matches where weaker county opposition has proved to be almost more than Sri Lanka could cope with: without help from the weather they might even have lost one of the games and at no point did they look like dominating. However, England supporters know that pre-series form (or lack of it) from tourists does not always point reliably to post-series celebration. England have also gone into the series with a side under a far larger cloud than an encouraging performance in the UAE v Pakistan, a series win against South Africa and a run to the World T20 Final would suggest.

Alex Hales struggled in the Tests in South Africa. Nick Compton started the series well, but faded and James Taylor cheated likely death, but will never play again at any level. It is a horrific thought that, at any moment during the South African series he could have collapsed and died on the pitch. The relief that there was no tragedy during the series should be weighed against the personal disaster that his career was ended just as he finally got a chance to show what he could do (remember those stunning catches at Short Leg?) Further down the order, Moeen Ali is heavily questioned and, with Wood, Woakes & Jordan unavailable or coming back from injury, the seam bowling reserves are looking thin again.

The selectors have shown loyalty, but Nick Compton’s form for Middlesex has been horrible and Alex Hales has only played two matches, taking a calculated gamble, but showing some decent form and obduracy. Both can count themselves somewhat lucky, especially with Sam Robson scoring a lot of runs and showing an effective re-modelled technique. James Vince has pipped a number of rivals to the vacant #5 spot to general approval. The general impression though is that England entered the series only a couple of defeats from crisis, particularly as Jimmy Anderson is probably only an injury from retirement and Stuart Broad’s body has already given the surgeons plenty to occupy them – the loss of either would be serious.

Day 1 gave plenty to worry the England fans. After a solid start, the introduction of the sort of dibby-dobby, mid-70s bowler who India have often deployed with success against England brought dividends for Sri Lanka too. No one checks their helmet and life insurance when Shanaka comes on, but England’s batsmen seemed to want to get back to the safety of the pavilion with indecent haste when he appeared. 49-0 disintegrated into 83-5 and if Alex Hales had not held firm, England could have been heading for humiliation.

Hales’s innings was characterised by the same obduracy and fighting spirit that he showed for Notts when holding their innings together in his season debut innings. Criticised for slow scoring and being painful to watch, only Jonny Bairstow and Angelo Matthews have actually scored faster in the match. The atmospheric conditions have encouraged the bowlers, as has the pitch, which has enough to help the bowler who lands the ball in the right place: even the spinner, as Alex Hales found to his cost. Hales was furious at missing-out on a maiden Test century, but credit Herath for getting a fraction of turn that changed an attacking shot into what looked like an irresponsible slog. Hales though has certainly done enough to guarantee his place for the rest of the series. The same cannot be said for Compton (at least dismissed by a good ball), or Moeen Ali.

With England only getting close to 300 thanks to a ninth wicket stand from Bairstow and Finn, things were going to go one of two ways: if the bowlers got it right, it could be brief and bloody for Sri Lanka; if they got it wrong, there were horrible visions of how Australia racked-up 401-9d at Headingley in 1981 when they should not have got past 200.

What no one imagined was that the Follow On mark of 99 would come into play. The opening overs passed with some alarms, but no great indication of the things to come. Then Stuart Broad got one in exactly the right place, the rout started. Three wickets in nine balls and Sri Lanka were in trouble. Two mini-recoveries and it looked as if the worst might be over: at least, at 77-4, the follow-on target looked to be the least of Sri Lanka’s worries. At 83-7 horrible imaginings must have been appearing. 90-7: a couple of edges and they would be there and there would be the hope that the weather might help them out.

England took some extraordinary catches. Two from Steve Finn turned what should have been an academic debate about the Follow On into a reality but, even then two edged boundaries would have seen Sri Lanka safe – how often have you seen the last pair ride their luck that way? However, when your #11 faces just one ball and puts the health and safety of the Square Leg umpire at risk, so fast is he backing-away, the outlook is not so rosy. Strangle down the leg side, thin edge, England review… thanks very much! 5-16 for Jimmy Anderson. 4-21 for Stuart Broad. Lowering skies and every prospect of plenty of interruptions of play to keep the bowlers fresh. Even Alistair Cook did not hesitate in telling Sri Lanka that Anderson and Broad fancied a few more overs at them.

298ao was enough to enforce the Follow On. It is the equal seventh lowest ever 1^st innings score to do so:

Side Batting First	Opponents	Year	Total	1st Innings Lead	Follow On
South Africa	Pakistan	2013	253	204	Not enforced
England	New Zealand	1958	269	222	Enforced
Australia	England	1895	284	219	Enforced
India	Sri Lanka	1990	288	206	Enforced
England	South Africa	1889	292	245	Enforced
New Zealand	India	1965	297	209	Enforced
England	India	1967	298	206	Not enforced
England	Sri Lanka	2016	298	207	Enforced

Only eight times in Test history has a side scored less than 300 and been able to enforce the Follow On. Twice Sri Lanka have faced this indignity. Four times, England have induced it, the last time in 1967.

With Sri Lanka having barely survived a session in their first innings and nine sessions left, surely only a monsoon in Leeds can save them now.