Spinners lead England to famous series win

England’s spin trio of Jack Leach, Moeen Ali and Adil Rashid teamed up to give their team a famous series win over Sire Lanka at the Pallekele International Stadium yesterday. Chasing a 301 run target to square the three match series, Sri Lanka were bowled out for 243 runs to give England a 57 run win. The tourists wrapped up the three match series with a game to spare.

 

Sri Lanka required 75 runs with three wickets in hand on the final morning but were bowled out for 243 runs as England dismissed the last three batsmen within 32 minutes of final day’s play.

 

Sri Lanka’s chances depended on Niroshan Dickwella, who was 27 not out overnight but he was dismissed for 35 when Ben Stokes took a catch off Moeen’s bowling. Two balls later Suranga Lakmall was bowled by Moeen to take England closer to victory.

 

Jack Leach completed the win when he took a return catch off last man Malinda Pushpakumara. The left-arm spinner finished with a maiden five wicket haul and claimed a match bag of eight wickets playing only his third Test match.

 

Moeen Ali finished with seven wickets in the game while leg-spinner Adil Rashid claimed four wickets.

 

Sri Lanka’s spin trio of Dilruwan Perera, Akila Dananjaya and Malinda Pushpakumara were well below par compared to England’s spin bowlers.

 

Captain Joe Root was named Man of the Match for his century in the second innings.

 

The tourists won the first Test in Galle by 211 runs.

 

England’s last series win in Sri Lanka came in 2001 under Nasser Hussain’s captaincy.

 

The teams will now head to Colombo where the third Test will be played at the Sinhalese Sports Club ground starting on Friday.

 

Off-spinner Akila Dananjaya will miss the third Test as he will travel to Brisbane, Australia to complete testing after his action was reported as suspect.

 

 

 

Scoreboard

 

England 1st innings 290 (J. Buttler 63, S. Curran 64; D. Perera 4-61)

 

Sri Lanka 1st innings 336 (R. Silva 85, D. Karunaratne 63; J. Leach 3-70, A. Rashid 3-75)

 

England 2nd innings 346 (J. Root 124, B. Foakes 65, R. Burns 59; Dananjaya 6-115, Perera 3-96)

 

Sri Lanka 2nd innings (overnight 226-7)

 

D. Karunaratne c Foakes b Rashid  57

 

K. Silva st Foakes b Leach          4

 

D. de Silva c Jennings b Leach      1

 

K. Mendis lbw b Leach               1

 

A. Mathews lbw b Moeen             88

 

R. Silva c Root b Moeen            37

 

N. Dickwella c Stokes b Moeen      35

 

D. Perera lbw b Leach               2

 

A. Dananjaya not out                8

 

S. Lakmal (capt) b Moeen            0

 

M. Pushpakumara c and b Leach      1

 

Extras: (b5, lb4)                    9

 

Total: (all out; 74 overs)         243

 

Fall of Wickets: 14-1 (K. Silva), 16-2 (de Silva), 26-3 (Mendis), 103-4 (Karunaratne), 176-5 (R. Silva), 221-6 (Mathews), 226-7 (D. Perera), 240-8 (Dickwella), 240-9 (Lakmal), 243-10 (Pushpakumara)

 

Bowling: Anderson 5-2-12-0, Leach 28-2-83-5, Moeen Ali 19-2-72-4, Adil Rashid 17-1-52-1, Root 5-0-15-0

 

Result: England win by 57 runs

 

England take winning 2-0 lead in three-match series

 

Toss: England

 

Umpires: Marais Erasmus (RSA) and Sundaram Ravi (IND)

 

TV umpire: Chris Gaffaney (AUS)

 

Match referee: Andy Pycroft (ZIM)