{"id":47595,"date":"2016-07-30T20:49:31","date_gmt":"2016-07-31T00:49:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/?p=47595"},"modified":"2016-07-30T20:50:44","modified_gmt":"2016-07-31T00:50:44","slug":"sri-lanka-scores-106-run-victory-over-no-1-ranked-australia-in-opening-test-played-at-pallekalle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/?p=47595","title":{"rendered":"Seventh Ranked Sri Lanka Spins its Way to Incredible 106 Run Victory Over No 1 Ranked Australia in Opening Test Played at Pallekalle"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Aubrey Kuruppu in Pallekele<\/strong><\/p>\n

Angelo Matthews\u2019 much-maligned men performed the incredible when they swept to a 106-run win over Australia slightly before tea on day five of the opening Test in the series at the Pallekele Stadium yesterday.<\/p>\n

Under the cash for their performances from the World Cup, the Sri Lankans, unheralded and unsung, came back in a big way to net the biggest fish of them all \u2014 the number one ranked team in the world. Tutored and advised no end in the art of playing spin on turning wickets, when it came to the crunch, the Aussies (save for one or two), found the Sri Lankan spinners a difficult proposition.<\/p>\n

The reliable left-armer Rangana Herath had a match-bag of 9 for 103, while debutant Lakshan Sandakan finished with seven for 102. More importantly, he sowed the seeds of doubt in Aussies minds by his sharp and unreadable spin.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Herath, the mastermind<\/strong><\/p>\n

The man who set up this win, and rightly earned the man-of-the-match award, was the prodigiously talented 21-year-old, Kusal Mendis. His splendid innings of 176 was just about half the Sri Lankan second innings\u2019 total. He seemed free of nerves, put the bad balls away and stepped the good. His innings should imbue some of his top order players with confidence in the Tests to come.<\/p>\n

This is Australia\u2019s second loss to Sri Lanka in 27 Tests. The first was in that Test at Asgiriya in September 1999. Steve Smith has lost his first Test as skipper in his 12th attempt.<\/p>\n

A slightly delayed start on day five may have perturbed the team and the supporters. But they made up for lost time by disposing of Adam Voges shortly after the start. The Aussie goose seemed to have been cooked because he was the player who could have dug in for the long haul and bailed them out. He is also the player who had a Bradman-esque average.<\/p>\n

Smith was devoid of his quirky mannerisms as he concentrated hard and endeavoured to shore up his team\u2019s innings. His only boundary was a back foot force through the untenanted covers off a short Sandakan delivery. For the most part, he was flicking through square leg and mid-wicket. His 55 off 125 balls was important to his team. With him out there, there was still some hope.<\/p>\n

Mitchell Marsh was impressive once again, Striking the ball crisply. his reach permitted him to keep the spinner at bay. But the Aussies who lost Smith at 139, also lost March one run later. Mitchell Starc\u2019s was a very soft dismissal. The imperious drives for four through the covers in one Dilruwan Perera over proclaimed his pedigree. On the backfoot to a Sandakan delivery, he served up a dolly to the bowler.<\/p>\n

Then came a staggering rear-guard action by the injured and almost immobile Steve O\u2019Keefe and the stumper Peter Nevill. They kept the Sri Lankans at bay for more than 25 overs while they added a mere four runs. Those came when O\u2019Keefe bestirred himself to sweep a delivery for four. Plenty of singles were not taken as O\u2019Keefe was almost immobile.<\/p>\n

Mendis, the craftsman<\/strong><\/p>\n

Another debutant, Dhananjaya de Silva, made the long-awaited breakthrough when his back-of-the-hand delivery was edged to Dinesh Chandimal by Nevill. The latter read it late and tried a hurried cut. With the last man in, O\u2019Keefe came down the track to a Herath delivery, missed and was castled.<\/p>\n

In was joy, pure and unconfined, for the Sri Lankans who had to put up with a quite a bit of criticism. There were even some misguided calls for the captain\u2019s head. The series has only started. Even though this is not one of the great Australian sides, they will come back fighting. But Matthews has now got the bit between his teeth and he is not likely to surrender the initiative all that easily. The next Test will be at the low and slow Galle Stadium and the Aussies will be similarly tested.<\/p>\n

One final point: what happens to the two-tier system when the seventh ranked team topples the first?<\/p>\n

Courtesy:Sunday Times<\/em><\/p>\n

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By Aubrey Kuruppu in Pallekele Angelo Matthews\u2019 much-maligned men performed the incredible when they swept to a 106-run win over Australia slightly before tea on day five of the opening Test in the series at the Pallekele Stadium yesterday. Under the cash for their performances from the World Cup, the Sri Lankans, unheralded and unsung, …<\/p>\n

Continue reading ‘Seventh Ranked Sri Lanka Spins its Way to Incredible 106 Run Victory Over No 1 Ranked Australia in Opening Test Played at Pallekalle’ »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[12],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47595"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=47595"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47595\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":47597,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47595\/revisions\/47597"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=47595"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=47595"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dbsjeyaraj.com\/dbsj\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=47595"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}