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New Zealand 59 for 1 (Raval 43, Latham 14*) trail Sri Lanka 282 (Mathews 83, Dickwella 80*, Southee 6-68) by 223 runs
Jeet Raval and Tom Latham put on 59 for the first wicket – nine more than their highest partnership in six innings in UAE last month against Pakistan – to allow New Zealand a solid start, but Raval’s indecisive pull to a skiddy Lahiru Kumara bouncer off the last ball by before lunch gave Sri Lanka the spark they dearly needed.
On a hot day, with the pitch perhaps at its best for batting, the openers played out 22.5 overs impeccably, until Raval’s rush of blood cost him a seventh Test fifty and beyond, as he was out for 43. In just four overs of sharp, accurate fast bowling, Lahiru Kumara proved why holding him back till the 16th over of the innings was perhaps a mistake.
Early in the day, Niroshan Dickwella played a trademark scoop to begin proceedings, but Sri Lanka managed just seven to their overnight 275 for 9 before last man Kumara was dismissed. He was superbly caught at leg slip by Colin de Grandhomme off a thick inside edge that flew in-between the batsman’s legs.
Dickwella was stranded on 80, three short of his highest Test score, as Tim Southee finished with 6 for 68 – his eighth five-for in Tests. This was also his maiden five-for at the Basin Reserve.
New Zealand were afforded the opportunity to dig in, partly because of Dinesh Chandimal’s conservative captaincy. Where New Zealand employed just three overs of spin in the entire Sri Lankan innings, Sri Lanka already bowled two inside the first 15 through Dilruwan Perera. Even Angelo Mathews, a reluctant bowler who hadn’t turned his arm over in Tests since June 2017, was summoned before the bustling Kumara,
When he was finally brought in to bowl, his raw pace induced a false stroke that nearly gave Sri Lanka a wicket. Hustled for pace in attempting a pull, Raval gloved a short delivery that lobbed high but fell short of the diving Dickwella behind the stumps.
Raval went on to play some gorgeous strokes through the off side – on the up through extra cover and mid-off – once he saw through the first few overs, where the new-ball bowlers didn’t make him play enough. Yet when he did, the timing was sublime, a step out to play an inside-out drive through extra cover off Dilruwan clearly being the shot of the morning.
Latham at the other end build on this confidence, but was given an early reprieve in the first over, this time because of poor field placement. Jabbing at a late inswinger from Suranga Lakmal, the ball popped off a thick inside edge to where a short leg would’ve been. Sri Lanka had one fielder stationed there for the rest of the session, but it was a reactive decision that didn’t help their cause.
Having spent a better part of the first two hours largely untroubled, New Zealand’s openers laid down the marker for a huge first innings total. Sri Lanka may already be thinking if they underachieved on what seems increasingly at least a 350 surface.
Shashank Kishore is a senior sub-editor at ESPNcricinfo
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