Hosts started the day with a very good session restricting England for 421 but what most important is it happen before the lunch break. Those two deliveries Asitha Fernando bawled after changing of the unshaped ball was the game changer. Till then England were heading to a score passing 500 where Joe Root and Jose Buttler was well set. Asitha Fernando’s lines and lengths were always asking questions and batsmen were struggling to score. Anyhow Joe Root was untroubled and his knock was well established till the end.
In the second session Sri Lankan openers were really good with the bat and most importantly they didn’t gave their wicket away. Stuart Broad bawled well but SL openers face him carefully and didn’t gifted their wicket to him as in the first innings. Patience of the players were showcased in this period of time and it is a clear win for the hosts at the end.
Kusal Janith was dismissed after well-made 62 runs when he attempts to hit a wide delivery over backward point for a six but ended up in his buckets of hands. Then Kusal Mendis came to the wicket with four consecutive “0” to his name but he managed to get a score this time. Thirimanna scored intelligently without rushing himself to anything silly in his inning of unbeaten 76 at the end of the days play. Kusal Mendis was dismissed by Jack Leech with a peach of a delivery for 15 runs.
Tomorrow the fourth day will be crucial for the host as they are still 132 runs behind. Building partnerships will be the key and senior players like Mathews, Chandimal and Dickwella will play a big part in that. Thirimanna has to make his innings as deep as possible to post a good target score to the oppositions. Most importantly hosts may have to increase their scoring rate also the days play but thinking of the game session by session will keep them in the hunt. Let’s hope for the best cheers Lankans !!!
