England in Control in Manchester

The test match between England and Sri Lanka is into the final session of the third day. England have fared very well. I covered events of the first day here, so what follows will look at days two and three.

DAY TWO

Yesterday was a work day, so I missed most of the play. Almost all of the England front line batters (Pope being the exception) got some sort of start, but they also got out without going on to really big scores, with the exception of Jamie Smith who batted superbly and ensured that England were well placed. England were 259-6, 23 runs ahead on first innings when rain and bad light halted the action, with Smith 72 not out.

DAY THREE

The morning session gave the lie to those who had worried that England’s decision to play five front line bowlers with Woakes at number seven had left them with too long a tail. It was over an hour before England lost a wicket, Atkinson being the one to go for 20. By then Smith had completed his maiden test century, and England had moved past 300. At 315 Smith himself fell, for 111. However Potts, Wood (22 off 13 balls) and Bashir added a further 43 entertaining runs for the last two wickets before England were all out. In the run up to lunch things got better still for England as Woakes and Atkinson bagged a wicket a piece in the mini-session Sri Lanka had to negotiate before the interval. The second session of the day was better for Sri Lanka, although they lost the wickets of Karunaratne and their captain Dhananjaya de Silva, and also saw Chandimal suffer an injury when a ball from Wood struck his thumb, which was serious enough to at least temporarily remove him from the action. Angelo Mathews and Kamindu Mendis got Sri Lanka to the tea interval, though they were still in arrears at that point. That pair are still together as I type, with Sri Lanka now 146-4, 24 runs ahead overall. There was a bizarre outcome to a review of an LBW appeal by England when TV replay Umpire Joel Wilson requested a split screen showing bowler and wicket keeper at the time the ball was delivered to check whether the wicket keepers gloves were wholly behind the stumps, as required by law 27.3.1 – and they were not, leading to a call of no-ball and an extra run to the SL total, but fortunately for Smith the replay showed that even had this offence not happened the not out verdict wouldn’t have been overturned – it was umpire’s call on whether it was hitting the stumps.

PHOTOGRAPHS

My usual sign off…