London: An excellent innings of 86 from 79 balls from Ben Duckett took England to 156 for two, at the time of going to press, shortly before tea on the first day of the third Test, interrupted by bad light and rain.
Sri Lanka made two changes in their team for this final Test of the three-Test series which has seen England take an impregnable lead with victory by five wickets in the first Test and 190 runs in the second. Both ended on the fourth day of the scheduled five. The tourists dropped opening batsman Nishan Madushka and left-arm spinner Prabath Jayasuriya replacing them with Kusal Mendis and left-arm pace bowler Vishwa Fernando.
England’s only change was all-rounder Matthew Potts being replaced by Test debutant Josh Hull, a 6ft 7in tall, left-arm pace bowler who has been most impressive in first-class cricket for his county Leicestershire.
Despite deciding to put England in to bat in overcast conditions, Sri Lanka were unable to exert any pressure on the batsmen and they scored at the rate of five-an-over in the first nine overs before losing Dan Lawrence in the tenth over with the total on 45. Lawrence has a tendency to play to leg-side and this time, to a ball on the off, he attempted to hit towards mid-on but only managed an edge to gully for 5.
Meanwhile Ben Duckett was going well, scoring quite freely. There wasn’t a maiden over bowled by Sri Lanka until the 14th over. He took a four off Asitha Fernando and Vishwa Fernando to get into double figures and then one off Lahiru Kumara to reach 21.
Half his runs had come from fours when he reached 40, which included two consecutive fours off Milan Ranatunga after he had been brought on in place of Asitha Fernando. He skipped down the pitch to drive the first to the off and then a powerful drive through cover.
Ollie Pope who has struggled for runs in this series and seems to feel the pressure after taking over as captain from the injured Ben Stokes would have felt a little confident after hitting a four and then a six over deep backward square leg off Kumara.
A beautifully timed four between gully and backward point followed by a powerful drive to cover for four took Duckett to 48 before he ran three to bring up his tenth Test half century from 48 balls which included 7 fours.
Twenty minutes before the scheduled lunch time bad light brought play to a stop on 76 for one with Duckett on 51 and Pope on 14 and 15 overs had been bowled. Lunch was taken early and play finally resumed at 3.10 pm with tea decided for 5.10 pm local time.
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