Sri Lanka wage losing battle

Angelo Mathews ticked along after three early wickets

• Face long haul chasing target of 483

Dimuth Karunaratne scored a fighting half-century for Sri Lanka

Lord’s: Sri Lanka was waging a losing battle in their bid to save the second cricket Test and the three-match series against England, going to lunch on the fourth day at Lord’s Sunday at 136-4, trailing by a massive 347 runs.

Behind 1-0 after losing the first Test at Manchester by five wickets, Sri Lanka lost a couple of wickets in the fourth morning, one of them being that of night watchman Prabath Jayasuriya for four scored off 41 balls.

More damaging for Sri Lanka was the loss of Dimuth Karunaratne’s wicket shortly before the extended lunch break for a well-compiled half-century. With the pitch not offering as much for the England seamers as it did in the first innings, Karunaratne and Angelo Mathews managed to build up a partnership of 55, and just when things looked slightly bright for Sri Lanka, Olly Stone brought in for a late burst of short pitched stuff managed to unsettle Karunaratne, having him caught off his gloves for 55 scored off 129 balls (7 fours).

During his knock, Karunaratne (6990) went past Sanath Jayasuriya (6973), the present interim head coach, for most runs made for Sri Lanka in Tests, moving to fourth in the batting list after Kumar Sangakkara, Mahela Jayawardene, and Mathews.

Although England bowlers hit the right areas and managed to sustain pressure and asked questions regularly, Sri Lanka managed to survive till lunch with Mathews and Dinesh Chandimal at the wickets left to repeat their efforts at Old Trafford, with the in form Kamindu Mendis to come in beautiful batting conditions with the sun out and blue skies on a slow pitch.

Mathews was unbeaten on 34 and Chandimal on 15, with Sri Lanka having a long haul ahead of them with five sessions of play left in the match.