England get a lead of 286 as wickets and run runs on the third morning
Lon England 421 (Root 228, Lawrence 73) lead Sri Lanka 135 ro 286 run
Sri Lanka is embarking on a desperate fight for survival after Joe Root brought England into a seemingly incomprehensible situation in the first Test in Galle.
Root’s double era – his fourth test career and his second as captain – helped England make the first inning attack of 286 before they were sent off on the sidelines of lunch on the third day.
The ease with which Root could run his run could give a somewhat misleading view of the nature of this park. But while Root seemed to find life pretty simple – he was the last man out there, caught on the long end, ten minutes before the scheduled lunchtime – he probably is. note that only two other men in the game so far have made more than 30 and the last five in the England side have only scored 17 runs between them. Sri Lanka referenced six wikis in the morning session, making use of a surface that generously supports spinning bowlers.
Only Wally Hammond (with seven) and Sir Alastair Cook (with five) now have two doubles for England. Root’s score here also represents the second highest score by an English player in Asia after 263 at Cook that was not knocked out in Abu Dhabi in 2015.
Root went over 8,000 test runs during the course of the intestines. He is the seventh Englishman to reach the landmark and, in terms of innings (this is his 178th) is the second fastest after Kevin Pietersen, who reached the milestone in 176 innings.
It was not long before any hope Sri Lanka might have had of its early progress was dashed. Root eased the third ball of the day, from Asitha Fernando, through the covers for four while Jos Buttler’s response to seeing his defensive shot hit by a beautiful arm from Dilruwan Perera to go attacked. He turned his back on his next ball for four and, after waking up Lasith Embuldeniya with a similar bullet, responded with a pull over the middle of a wicket when the bowler changed his length.
At one point, Root took 14 from three deliveries with a loft trip for six over distant Perera and a pair of wickets – a feature of this inn – far from Embuldeniya; CricViz has suggested that there has been more sweeping in the Root host than any test innings where such data exists. Embuldeniya, perhaps exhausted after more than 40 excesses, was taken for three boundaries in excess at one stage.
Fernando, however, gave Sri Lanka a brief moment of joy. The sailor had only hit nine of the first 100 overs in the innings but, just after a ball out of shape changed, he got a little late swing to claim wickets with two consecutive deliveries. He first gave Buttler a fringe with a full tide that left him late, before persuading a man to go back between bat and Sam Curran ‘s cap for bowling. Dom Bess negotiated the hat-trick ball securely enough but it was run out shortly afterwards as Root, against a high claim for lbw, called it through for an impossible single. Jack Leach was caught in front of him with a sharp turning leg fracture and Mark Wood fouled an attempt to sweep and grabbed the keeper.
Stuart Broad survived to be handed out twice in three balls – umpire Kumar Dharmasena had to change his decisions after DRS showed none of his LBW decisions were correct – and responded with limitations after Fernando.
But before that time death was thrown. On a pitch offering more support to spinning bowlers, England’s lead had stretched beyond the horizon. Perhaps Sri Lanka ‘s best hope of survival is to return the dwindling rain the second day.
George Dobell is a senior writer at ESPNcricinfo