London, Sept 8
With the England second innings suffering an astonishing collapse on the third day of the third Test against Sri Lanka the Test appears to be wide open for a result with Sri Lanka two Tests down in the series. Shortly before tea – at the time of going to press – England are 104 for seven with an overall lead of 166 with three wickets remaining. With Sri Lanka’s second innings to come, the Test is poised for an exciting finish with two days play remaining.
With a first innings lead of 62 after Sri Lanka had been dismissed for 263, England suffered an extraordinary collapse in their second innings which began just over half-an-hour before lunch. Ben Duckett fell in the third over, mistiming his drive to the off and was held for 7 off Asith Fernando.
The next two wickets went to Lahiru Kumara with Ollie Pope playing-on with an inside edge for 7 and dan Lawrence managing 35 before edging behind and that was 36 for three. The next four suffered an inexplicable collapse on the total of 66 and 69 Joe Root and Harry Brook were trapped lbw.
A run later Chris Woakes went without scoring and Gus Atkinson, a centurion in the previous Test had one run before becoming the third to be pinned in front of his stumps and England were 82 for seven.
Earlier, Sri Lanka resumed their first innings on the third morning 114 runs behind England’s total of 325 on a score of 211 for five and with the sixth wicket unbroken stand worth 118 at that stage the momentum was with Sri Lanka. Both overnight batsmen had already completed their half centuries, Dhananjaya de Silva was on 64 and Kamindu Mendis on 54.
England wasted little time in striking early and in the third over of the day, with an addition of just nine runs to the overnight total, the captain Dhananjaya de Silva was dismissed for 69. He had faced 111 balls and 44 of his runs had come from fours. He had top-edged his pull shot off Josh Hull for a catch at deep backward square leg, giving the Test debutant his second wicket for 35 in 6.1 overs.
Chris Woakes then accounted for Kamindu Mendis having the left hander edge to first slip as he played form the crease at a ball that came into him and Sri Lanka were down to 233 for seven.
The tourists’ middle order was clearly uncomfortable and Hull struck, five runs later, for his third wicket of the innings as he trapped Vishwa Fernando leg before with a ball that he brought into the batsman. The third umpire rightly decided that ball would have hit top of leg stump.
Olly Stone, who was to drop a catch later from Lahiru Kumara, which would give the Test debutant his fourth wicket, then removed the ninth wicket having Milan Ratnayake snapped up behind for seven.
Ollie Pope then brought on Shoaib Bashir for the 58th over on 248 for nine, an hour and a half after the start of the day’s play and the off spinner struck with the wicket of Asith Fernando who was held behind off his gloves and wrist band for 11 with the last pair adding 15 to take the total to 263 all out. Sri Lanka had lost their five wickets for 43 in a space of 13.1 overs.
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