Irish struggling against accurate Sri Lankan spin

Beaten inside three days by an innings and 280 runs in the first Test, Ireland will be using the extra couple of days to prepare well for Sri Lanka’s spin threat lead up to the second Test in Galle starting next week.

After Sri Lanka posted a mammoth 591 for six declared, the Irish faced stiff challenge as Vishwa Fernando claimed two wickets in his first over before Prabath Jayasuriya took over and bowled superbly to claim career-best figures of seven for 52 in the first innings. The left-arm spinner finished with a match bag of ten wickets as Sri Lanka enforced the follow on.

Off-spinner Ramesh Mendis too claimed five wickets and became the joint-fastest Sri Lankan to take 50 wickets in Test match cricket. Both Dilruwan Perera and Ramesh Mendis had achieved the milestone in their 11th Test match.

Although Mendis was among wickets, he wasn’t bowling at his best offering too many loose balls and against a quality opposition he would have paid the price. But Jayasuriya was quite the contrast. There were hardly any bad balls from him, and he got the better of most Irish batsmen sticking to his basics bowling to attacking fields.

“Sri Lanka’s spinners bowled so well. They were very accurate, and we struggled against them. That’s what we have got to deal with. Some balls turn and some don’t, and we need to read them well,” Irish skipper Andy Balbirnie told journalists.

“We fought in stages but not good enough. We are learning what it means to play Test cricket. Hopefully, we’ll learn quickly and put up a better fight in the next game. We have a few extra days to prepare and hope to use that to good effect. It is important to put big scores in the first innings and that’s something that we have failed to do both here and in Dhaka in our last Test match,” he added.

No Irishman managed a half-century in the entire game and that was some disappointment. However, Harry Tector showed plenty of character batting at number four and was unlucky to be run out in the second innings. “One huge disappointment is nobody scoring a half-century in this game. In Dhaka at least, we had a couple of guys making decent scores.”

“Very happy with the character shown by Harry Tector in both innings. He’s a young guy and a superb find for us. He was very unlucky to get out in the fashion he did. I thought he batted sensibly, particularly in the second innings,” the Irish skipper said.