England v Sri Lanka, 2nd Test: Day 4 - England Made to Sweat to Seal the Series

 

England v Sri Lanka

2^nd Test: Day 4

England Made to Sweat to Seal the Series

 

June 1^st  2016

 

Belated comments on the end of the 2^nd Test.

After three and a half chastening matches when Essex, perennial whipping boys Leicestershire and then England exposed their inadequacies, Sri Lanka fought back to such an extent that, at 430-6 after Lunch, horrible imaginings must have been surfacing among the England players. Not only was heavy rain forecast for Day 5, which almost wiped-out play in the County Championship (although ironically, Durham saw not a drop of rain) but, on a pitch taking some turn, there was just a chance that a lead of 150 might have made things very interesting. . Sri Lanka’s resistance did, at least, offer Alistair Cook the opportunity to become the youngest player to 10000 Test runs and thus dot the “i”s and cross the “t”s so that he can concentrate on what is important: scoring runs and winning matches.

Optimistic thoughts when Siriwardne fell early, that England were into the tail, proved unfounded. In the 1^st Test Rangana Herath conveyed the image that he wanted to be anywhere in the world other than in the middle with a bat in his hand facing the music so, when he came in to partner Chandimal with Sri Lanka still 83 short of making England bat again you would have put a lot of money on another innings defeat. Not a bit of it! Herath played a fine innings as Sri Lanka scored at a good clip and, had he stayed another hour, Sri Lanka might just have pulled off an amazing heist against an increasingly dispirited opponent. As it was, 430-6 became 475ao and the damage was limited.

This was an excellent lesson in humility for England.

It was obvious that, at some point, the Sri Lankan batting was going to click and that England would no longer get easy wickets. It was back to hard grind and severe punishment for dropping chances. Had England taken the ones that were offered, quite likely Sri Lanka would have lost by an innings. Mind you, had Sri Lanka taken theirs, England would never have been in a position to win by an innings in the first place.

Sometimes you have to be cruel to be kind and Sri Lanka’s performance has highlighted various issues that remain open and that Trevor Bayliss needs to work on and resolve:

·         Steve Finn is struggling. No current England bowler seems to have so many ups and downs as Steve Finn. Fantastic in South Africa, he is totally out of sorts here. Averaging low 80s and at times no better than high 70s on the speed gun, his series figures (4-138) look respectable thanks to three cheap wickets at the death in the 1^st Test but he has not really looked any kind of threat. However, dropping him for his home Test at Lord’s would deny him the chance to click again on a ground that is far more suited to his style of bowling although, if he bowls at these speeds on a flat, Lord’s wicket he will have zero impact except from on his own side’s chances.

·        Moeen Ali is looking increasingly vulnerable as a front-line spinner. Asked to do a holding job on a pitch offering some help, he was attacked and carted around the field by the Sri Lankans, as batsmen have now become accustomed to him and play his bowling on its merits. On what metric do you judge Moeen Ali? Everyone, not least probably he, was taken by surprise by his immediate impact in Tests, rocking Sri Lanka and India in 2014 and becoming “The Beard that is Feared”. At times he looks totally out of his depth as a spinner at this level, but then you look at his overall figures: 66 wickets in 25 Tests (2.6 wickets per Test – which is highly respectable), with a strike rate of an impressive 65.6, although averaging now 40.7. These figures are inferior to Graeme Swann and Monty Panesar, but comparable to or superior to just about any other England spinner of the last 30 years. Add in 1104 runs at 31.5 and 13 catches and you have a player who is certainly doing a job for the team: it is a far superior all-round record to, say, Ashley Giles. Should England look to playing a specialist spinner (but #11 bat) in the team alongside him at the cost of sacrificing a seamer?

·        Chris Woakes is beginning to justify the faith that the selectors have shown in him. The jury is still out, but this was, without a doubt, his most complete performance as a Test all-rounder. However, after 7 Tests he is still averaging only 24 with the bat and 47.8 with the ball. Can he demonstrate that he can take wickets consistently even when there is little help available?

·        The jury is still out on Nick Compton. When Alex Hales got a decent ball, Nick Compton probably had mixed feelings. On the one hand he had a chance, albeit brief, to score some runs. On the other, another failure would almost certainly have ended his Test career. In the end, 22* has done just enough to seal his place, especially as he batted with increasing confidence at the end, denying his captain the chance of a 50 by sealing the game with consecutive boundaries. He will need a good 3^rd Test to retain his place (Trevor Bayliss has mentioned Tom Westley, Scott Borthwick, Daniel Bell-Drummond and Mark Stoneman but, interestingly, only grudgingly acknowledged Sam Robson as an option to replace him), but is still hanging in there.

·        Jonny Bairstow is not the finished article. As a batsman he is really looking to have arrived although, after 26 Tests, his batting average is only 35.7, due mainly to a difficult start to his England career. As a wicket-keeper he is subject to the merciless scrutiny that wicket-keepers suffer when, of the 1031 balls that he faced behind the stumps, people focus on just three: a missed stumping, a dropped catch and a ball that scuttled through his legs for four byes. That said, the record for a 3-Test series is 17 dismissals (held by the much-maligned Geraint Jones) and Jonny Bairstow is on 16 after just two Tests – he must be doing something right. People often forget that Rod Marsh was called “Iron Gloves” when he started (and not affectionately either) and fans were often enraged that Alec Stewart took the gloves early in his career: both became very fine wicket-keepers; Jonny Bairstow will undoubtedly do the same, but he may need a hide like a rhinoceros to ignore the criticisms before it happens.