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Woeful England capitulate to Murali

Monday, December 22 2003

It was another opposition and a similar story at Colombo's SSC as Muttiah Muralitharan rapidly cleaned up the tame English batting line up on day four to take the match, and with it the series, 1-0.

Resuming on 563/5, Sri Lanka set about England with intent from the first over, with James Kirtley's second ball dispatched to the fine leg fence by Upul Chandana. Ashley Giles provided some respite for England as he drew Tillakaratne Dilshan (83) down the track and turned it past the advancing batsman to rearrange his wickets.

It was Giles again who created the next breakthrough, deflecting Chandana's straight drive onto the stumps at the non-striker's end, to find Chaminda Vaas (9) with his bat in the air. Kirtley was rewarded in the next over as Chandana's swish to his slower ball only ended up with a leading edge to Michael Vaughan at short extra cover.

Muttiah Muralitharan than prolonged England's pain, taking twenty off Ashley Giles' sixty-fifth and final over of the innings, and this was followed by Hashan Tillakaratne's declaration. 628/8 was the total and the lead, 363.

Could England call upon the spirit and resilience they showed at Kandy and Galle and save the series? In short, no. Vaas struck in the first over as Marcus Trescothick seemed to decide substitute gully Michael Vandort needed catching practice.

Dilhara Fernando's slower ball, following two bouncers, tempted Vaughan into driving him straight to Sanath Jayasuriya at short extra cover and England were already well on the back foot. It wasn't long before Muralitharan was called upon, and Nasser Hussain was removed in the spinner's fourth over, with a tickle through to Kumar Sangakkara - Murali's 100th Test wicket at the SSC.

Graham Thorpe and Mark Butcher restored a measure of sanity as England crawled to 82/3, until disaster struck in the 38th over. Thorpe advanced to Muralitharan, but was beaten in the flight, leaving Sangakkara with a regulation stumping. Gareth Batty followed next ball in a near-identical manner, as his forward defensive left him out of his crease and - after a consultation with the third umpire - Sangakkara's quick glovework was rewarded.

If England thought that was bad, it was about to get worse. Butcher was next to fall as Jayasuriya's slow left arm sneaked through the left-hander's gate and into the off stump. The same bowler struck again in his next over as Chris Read was trapped plumb LBW for the second duck of the innings.

It was left to Ashley Giles and Andrew Flintoff to restore some degree of respectability from 84/7, and they added the highest partnership of the innings - 40 - before Dilhara Fernando's inswinging yorker accounted for the spinner, and the seamer struck again to account for Flintoff as his late cut hit too high on the bat and went only as far as Sangakkara.

137/9, and merely a matter of how long it would take to finish the job. 22 balls, to be precise. Anderson was dropped at second spin and Kirtley swept Murali's wrong-un for six, but it was the off spinner who had the last word as his stock off-break came back through the gate and bowled Kirtley for Test Wicket number 485.

It's a story of simply not being good enough on England's part - after finally winning the toss they let an excellent start go to waste, and then displayed amateur catching skills as Sri Lanka ran up a massive total before capitulating today. It's England's third heaviest innings defeat ever - only the West Indies (1973) and Australia (1946) have recorded bigger margins.

Sri Lanka have been the better side all series and thoroughly deserved their win. Muralitharan's series figures were an exceptional 231.4-109-320-26. Average - 12.30, Economy - 1.38. Ashley Giles (18 @ 29.95), Chaminda Vaas (13 @ 21.00) and Andrew Flintoff (9 @ 24.55) were the other stand-out performers with the ball, whilst the sole batting stars have been on the Sri Lankan side - Mahela Jayawardene (334 @ 83.50) and Tillakaratne Dilshan (246 @ 82.00), with able support from Thilan Samaraweera (214 @ 53.50) and Sanath Jayasuriya (209 @ 41.80). Michael Vaughan (221 @ 36.83) was the only Englishman to pass 200 runs.

England 265
A Flintoff 77, ME Trescothick 70
M Muralitharan 3/40, WPUJC Vaas 3/64

Sri Lanka 628/8 dec
TT Samaraweera 142, DPMD Jayawardene 134
A Flintoff 2/47, RJ Kirtley 2/131

England 148
MA Butcher 37, A Flintoff 30
M Muralitharan 4/63, CRD Fernando 3/27

Sri Lanka win by an innings & 215 runs

Sri Lanka win the Series 1-0

Posted by Neil