How Sri Lanka’s tigers have changed their stripes

Times Media

TELFORD VICE, Johannesburg

Before their series in England that ended yesterday, Sri Lanka were tigers at home and tiggers on the road. They had won just eight of the 43 test series they had played on foreign ground. Even less flatteringly, five of those successes were achieved in the B-grade backyards of Bangladesh and Zimbabwe.

But yesterday they clinched their first series in England by winning the second test at Headingley by 100 runs with one ball left in the match. In the first test at Lord’s, the Sri Lankans held on to draw with nine wickets down.

With that, notice had been served that Hashim Amla’s men will have to tame the most confident team of tigers yet in the two tests they will play on the Asian island next month.

Or will they? One win cannot change the fact that the Lankans have been victorious in only 15.15% of the tests they have contested outside of sub-continent conditions. In the sub and the United Arab Emirates, they have won 35.98% of the time. That figure rises to 41.59% in Sri Lanka itself.

By contrast, since readmission SA have won 48.11% of all their tests. At home, they have a winning percentage of 57.27; away, 38.24.

Is the gap between the teams as large as their rankings before yesterday’s result suggested - SA second, Sri Lanka seventh - and how far will it grow in the opposite direction once the Lankans are back in their Hundred Acre Wood?

Significantly, it seems. That’s if Mahela Jayawardene’s comments after the fourth day at Headingley are an indication of how his men will react to the standard SA tactic of using aggressive fast bowling to drill holes in their opponents’ psyche.

“Their idea of hurting us and hitting us on the head probably doesn’t work,” Jayawardene said at a press conference. “I thought we hung in there. We were disciplined enough.”

Another hardy SA perennial - trying to talk as hard a game as they play - appears equally unlikely to get them far in Sri Lanka.

“England were quite chirpy in the morning, but they quietened up after the first hour or so,” Jayawardene said. “But that’s just part of the game - we know who is on top and who is not.”

In fact, the South Africans can look forward to the usually demure Sri Lankans filling their ears with barbed words.

“Chirping them (England) is something we had spoken about,” Jayawardene said. “We’ve seen that under pressure, and they’re not quite up to it. There’s a few young guys to come in and they’ll get some sledging.”

And this, mind, from one of the most mannered, respectful opponents any team could hope to face.

But Jayawardene is also part of a side that has found more than one way to win. In the past, if Muttiah Muralitharan dominated, so did Sri Lanka: 18 of his 22 10-wicket hauls were claimed in a winning cause. In the 155 tests Sri Lanka played during Muralitharan’s career, they won 54 when he was in the XI and only five when he was not.

The Headingley match illustrates how much that has changed. Shaminda Eranga, a right-arm fast bowler playing his 13th test, and Angelo Mathews shared eight wickets in the first innings. In the second dig, Dhammika Prasad, another right-arm quick playing his 13th test, took 5/50.

A pair of sturdy half-centuries by Kumar Sangakkara, another by Jayawardene and a brilliant 160 by Mathews took care of the other end of Sri Lanka’s matchwinning equation.

It was a win for the ages, and that’s no poo.