By Joe Mansfield
LASITH Embuldeniya and Joe Root produced sublime performances to trade hammer blows to each nations progress on Day 3.
Joe Root executed one of the great innings against spin bowling to score 186 in the second Test at Galle, England trail by 42 going into the fourth day..
Lasith Embuldeniya snatched his third five wicket haul in 9 Test matches to rip through the England order. He ended the day with 7-132. Only Root had the answers to the question the off spinner posed as he struck a score of over 150 for the second consecutive test.
It was clear from the first delivery of the day that the wicket of Root would be the key for either team. England started the day on 98-2 and looked to deliver a counter punch to the Sri Lankan success from the second day.
Embuldeniya had other ideas and picked up the wicket of Bairstow. The number three batsman had looked assured at the crease but feathered an inside edge onto his pad and was caught at short leg.
Dan Lawrence replaced Bairstow at the crease, but he wasn’t there long due to the brilliance of Embuldeniya.
This was perhaps the pick of the left-armers wickets, drawing Lawrence into a shot by pitching the ball on middle stump and turning it sharply away from the right hander. The considerable turn caught the edge of the bat and was taken by Lahiru Thirimanne at slip.
Forced to rebuild yet again, Root and Jos Buttler set about their work with maturity and an intent to score. Both men applied their modern styles to good effect and utilised their ability to sweep and reverse sweep to manoeuvre the field.
Buttler brought up his 18th test half century while supporting his captain but was dismissed soon after reaching the landmark. The wicketkeeper-batsman was unfortunate with the method of his dismissal as he struck the ball down onto his boot and was caught at short-leg.
The battle between Root and Embuldeniya encapsulated the game, Sri Lanka’s stand out bowler against England’s best batsman. Root dominated the dual between them and applied pressure back to the Sri Lankan bowling attack.
While Root was at the non-strikers end he could not stem the flow of wickets though, Sam Curran was the next to go as the combination of Embuldeniya and Thirimanne at first slip picked up their third victim.
Those names littered the scorebook as Thirimanne took five catches and the off spinner took a career best seven wickets.
Dom Bess provided good support scoring 32 before he met the same fate as those before him. When Bess was removed, England had recovered to a respectable 333-7, but that later became 339-9 as Mark Wood threw away his wicket and Root was run out.
Roots monumental innings of 186 saw him overtake three greats of the game on the ladder of England’s all-time top run scorers. He surpassed Geoffrey Boycott, Kevin Pietersen and David Gower to go to fourth on the list.
England will start day four with one wicket in hand and needing a good day with ball in hand as they trail by 42.
Play will begin at 4:30am GMT on Monday.
England XI
Z Crawley, D Sibley, J Bairstow, J Root (C), D lawrence, J Buttler (WK), S Curran, D Bess, M Wood, J Leach, J Anderson.
Sri Lanka XI
L Thirimane, K Perera, O Fernando, D Chandimal (C), A, Mathews, N Dickwella (WK), S Lakmal, R Mendis, D Perera, L Embuldeniya, A Fernando.
