Outstanding catching compensates for innocuous bowling…

Brilliant Sri Lankan catching in cold conditions was the feature of the first day of the second Test at Chester-le-Street here on Friday where England winning the toss and batting first finished on 310 for six wickets.

Of the six wickets Sri Lanka took during the day four were due to outstanding catches.

Skipper Angelo Mathews’ blinder of a catch at slip to send back Alex Hales for 83 was the top of the lot. The England opener offered a full blooded cut off left-arm spinner Milinda Siriwardana and as the ball flew off the edge Mathews dived to his right and held the ball one-handed.

Sri Lanka’s brilliant catching compensated for the Lankan bowling which was too friendly on the slow pitch where the odd ball kept low.

Dimuth Karunaratne picked up a fine catch at slip to send back Alastair Cook for 15, denying the England captain his milestone of becoming the first Englishman to reach 10,000 Test runs. Cook started the day requiring 20 to reach the landmark but fell short by five when he was dismissed for 15.

Unless Sri Lanka put up a good first innings total, and make England to bat again in the second innings Cook may well have to wait until the start of the third and final Test at Lord’s on June 9 to get to the milestone. At Leeds, England batted only once and won the Test by an innings to go one-up in the three match series. Suranga Lakmal who replaced the injured Dushmantha Chameera pulled off a stunning catch at deep square leg when Nick Compton offered a full blooded pull with his score on nine.

The fourth catch of the day was held by Lahiru Thirimanne at short cover when James Vince drove at Siriwardana and the fielder diving to his right pulled off a ripper.

Sri Lankan bowling in these conditions looked harmless but their persistency paid rich dividends as they managed to prize out six England wickets.

Joe Root was the other England batsman to miss out on a hundred when he popped up a simple catch to Kaushal Silva at cover with his score on 80.

Hales and Root added 96 and Root also shared another half century stand with Vince. But each time England looked like running away with the game Sri Lanka managed to pull back and pluck a wicket.

Nuwan Pradeep was the pick of the Lankan bowlers finishing with three wickets for 69 including that of Jonny Bairstow the man of the match at Leeds with a career best 140. Bairstow fell to the second new ball attempting to slash at Pradeep and giving Dinesh Chandimal a straight forward catch after scoring 48 off 57 balls.

With Moeen Ali who was unbeaten on 28 at the close, Bairstow added 70 for the sixth wicket. Chris Woakes who replaced the injured Ben Stokes was not out eight.

Like Cook, left-arm spinner Rangana Herath was also left seeking his 300th Test wicket. Herath created some problems for the batsmen with his guile and flight but England managed to overcame it and deprive him of the milestone. Herath is shy of one wicket from becoming the third Sri Lankan bowler to get to the mark.

Siriwardana considered to be the man with the golden arm justified his selection ahead of Dasun Shanaka with two wickets – both to excellent catches by Mathews and Thirimanne.

In the gloomy morning it looked as if Sri Lanka had got it all wrong when they left out Shanaka for the left-arm spin of Siriwardana, but later as the day progressed and the wicket started to get slow and keep low it seemed a good choice.

It seems the Lankans whose fielding had dropped drastically in recent times have worked hard in this area and the results are showing on the field.

The overcast skies gave away to bright sunshine during the final session of play. The forecast for the next two days is for good weather.