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| Sunday, 2 June 2002 |
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Uphill task for Sri Lanka to save Test Sa'adi Thawfeeq reporting from England BIRMINGHAM, June 1 - Sri Lanka were forced to run for cover with nowhere to hide after England took full control of the second cricket Test at Edgbaston here today. By the end of an absorbing third day, England had Sri Lanka fighting with their backs to the wall to save the Test at 132 for two wickets, still 251 runs in arrears to avoid an innings defeat and two full days of play remaining. The key man is vice captain Atapattu who will have to play the sheet anchor role as he did at Lord's in making 185. Sri Lanka will need another similar innings from him if they are to save this Test. Atapattu was unbeaten on 56 having completed his 11th Test fifty in 170 minutes off 133 balls with five fours. Batting with him is Mahela Jayawardene on 45 off 125 balls with five fours. The pair have so far added 102 for the third wicket. Bowled out for a disappointing 162 on the rain reduced first day, Sri Lanka were always going to have a fight on their hands once England had got away to a good start and started piling on the runs under bright and sunny conditions. Sri Lanka's only hope is for bad weather, the forecast of which is not all that bright for tomorrow, following two days of bright sunshine. The forecast for tomorrow (Sunday) is for rain showers and Monday is expected to be cloudy. Even still, Sri Lanka have a very long way to go before they can think of saving the Test. Their first priority is to wipe out the massive first innings deficit of 383 runs. The batsmen will have to show the same application and dedication that England displayed at Lord's when they followed on 280 runs behind on the first innings. Sri Lanka had one and a half sessions of the sunshine today, but failed to make the most of it when in the 51 minutes batting before tea, both left-handers Sanath Jayasuriya and Kumar Sangakkara were gone in a matter of five balls from Hoggard. Sri Lanka slid to 30-2 as Jayasuriya was yorked leg stump for 12 and Sangakkara was trapped lbw plumb in front as he tried to defend a ball pitching middle and leg for one. England made the best use of the sunny conditions to run up their highest ever total against Sri Lanka. The pitch is still conducive to bounce and although the Sri Lankan fast bowlers failed to extract much from it, it is a totally different ball game when England bowl on it. Their bowlers have the ability to extract more bounce and cause much discomfort to the batsmen. One wonders what impression Dilhara Fernando, Sri Lanka's quickest bowler would have made on this surface. Sri Lanka's main objective when play began on the third day was to capture the last five England wickets and also to ensure that England did not get away to a massive lead on the first innings. In the first 90 minutes of the day, things went according to plan when they captured four wickets for 28 runs to reduce England to 454 for 9, but from there onwards they were frustrated by a ninth wicket partnership between Thorpe and last man Matthew Hoggard who helped to raise the total by a further 91 runs in 123 minutes, a new last wicket record for England against Sri Lanka. The previous highest was 89 between John Crawley and Angus Fraser at the Oval in 1998. Left-hander Thorpe was on 61 when the ninth wicket fell and would never have fancied his chances of making it to his 11th Test hundred in the company of Hoggard whose Test career batting average was just below four. However Hoggard showed great determination and doggedness to bat for 94 of the 185 balls in the partnership to not only make his highest Test score of 17 (not out), but also help Thorpe get to three-figures. The Surrey left-hander reached the mark with a sharp single off Vaas to extra cover. He batted for 267 minutes and faced 202 balls, hitting 10 fours. At 51, Thorpe became the 14th England player to score 5000 runs in Test cricket. He was playing in his 75th Test and it was a chanceless knock. He was finally out at 123 square cutting a delivery from Fernando to Vaas at third man. Hoggard who took 23 balls to get off the mark became a thorn in the Sri Lankan side as he defied everything that was thrown at him, including the second new ball which was taken rather belatedly after 151 overs. His defiance enabled England to reach 500 in an innings for the second time in consecutive Tests against Sri Lanka in this series. They scored 529-5 declared at Lord's and the score of 545 here was their highest on this ground since 1985 when they made 595-5 declared against Australia. It was also England's highest total against Sri Lanka. Muralitharan as usual achieved the first breakthrough for the day, when he had Andrew Flintoff taken at silly mid-on by Hashan Tillakaratne for 29 ending a stand of 58 for the sixth wicket with Thorpe. Flintoff was rather unlucky as TV replays later showed the ball coming off his pads as he attempted a sweep shot. Darryl Harper was the umpire. The wicket however gave Muralitharan another five-wicket haul in his illustrious career (5 for 143). It was the 34th occasion in 75 Tests and the third time he had achieved it against England. Considering he was not 100 percent fit before the Test, he bowled a marathon 64 overs, 38 of them on the trot since tea on the second day. Then in one inspired eight-over spell, Zoysa who had gone wicketless for 61 runs in 11 overs took three wickets for seven runs off 12 balls. He sent back Alex Tudor, Ashley Giles and Andy Caddick, all of whom offered edges to balls leaving them outside off stump. Tillakaratne's catch at second slip to send back Tudor was his fourth and made him the first Sri Lankan to hold that many against England in one innings. Sri Lanka Cricketers pay tribute to Cronje Sri Lanka team manager Chandra Schaffter speaking on behalf of the team on the death of former South African captain Hansie Cronje said: "The whole world is sad by what has happened. Tragedy has overtaken a great player. Some of our players who played with him have started to like him very much". SRI LANKA - 1ST INNINGS 162
ENGLAND - 1ST INNINGS
(overnight 401-5)
M. Trescothick c Tillekeratne b Vaas 161
M. Vaughan c Jayasuriya b Muralitharan 46
M. Butcher b Muralitharan 94
N. Hussain b Muralitharan 22
G. Thorpe c Vaas b Fernando 123
A. Stewart c Tillekeratne b Muralitharan 7
A. Flintoff c Tillekeratne b Muralitharan 29
A. Tudor c Tillekeratne b Zoysa 3
A. Giles c Sangakkara b Zoysa 0
A. Caddick c Sangakkara b Zoysa 3
M. Hoggard not out 17
Extras (LB-19, W-6, NB-15) 40
TOTAL (all out) 545
FALL OF WICKETS: 1-92, 2-294, 3-338, 4-341, 5-368,
6-426, 7-436, 8-444, 9-454.
BOWLING: Vaas 41-3-141-1, Zoysa 24-3-93-3,
Muralitharan 64-12-143-5, Fernando 21.5-2-92-1,
Jayasuriya 6-2-27-0, de Silva 7-0-30-0.
SRI LANLA - 2ND INNINGS
M. Atapattu not out 56
S. Jayasuriya b Hoggard 12
K. Sangakkara lbw b Hoggard 1
M. Jayawardene not out 45
Extras (LB-4, NB-14) 18
TOTAL (for two wickets) 132
FALL OF WICKETS: 1,28, 2,30
BOWLING: Caddick 13-2-36-0, Hoggard 10-1-41-2,
Flintoff 5-0-18-0, Giles 16-3-21-0,
Tudor 5-1-12-0.
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