Lankans walk on water, SA tread it

Times Media

TELFORD VICE, Colombo

Everyone who was at the Sinhalese Sports Club (SSC) yesterday to see Mahela Jayawardene take a superb century off the SA attack on the first day of the second test should be thankful that he did.

Moments after Jayawardene swept Dean Elgar to go to his 34th hundred two balls before tea, from beyond the fine leg boundary the crackle and flash of fireworks rent the sticky air. With that, all present were jolted out of the daydream of a match that had been mired in one-sidedness since lunch.

Jayawardene was still there at stumps, having batted for six hours and faced 225 balls for his undefeated 140. Sri Lanka will resume on 305/5 this morning.

“We’ve got to earn the right in the first hour to be in a good position,” SA bowling coach Allan Donald said. “That first hour is going to be an investment session for us.”

Jayawardene’s ton was his 11th in 26 tests at SSC, his home ground. He averages 81.08 here compared to a mere 50.41 overall.

At only 1.73m tall, Jayawardene does not have much with which to swagger, but Sri Lanka needed calm experience at the crease yesterday. He provided that and then some, unlike in his innings of three and 10 in the first test.

“From the first ball he faced he was looking for runs - I didn’t see that in Galle,” Sri Lankan opener Kaushal Silva said.

With Jayawardene in a stand that grew to 131 and created the stability he needed to keep his focus sharp was Angelo Mathews, who won the toss and thereby earned Sri Lanka the right to dictate terms.

True to form, conditions in the morning begrudged the bowlers a modicum of assistance. SA took advantage by claiming three wickets, two of them with consecutive deliveries by Dale Steyn. They also dropped two catches.

But with lunch, when Sri Lanka were 115/3, went all pretence of a contest. By tea, they had added 97 without losing a wicket. SA were treading water, but the Lankans were walking on it.

The visitors took their next wicket in the 11th over after tea, when Mathews cut at JP Duminy and was caught behind for 63.

Four balls before lunch, Duminy had removed the nuggety Silva for 44 by way of a sharp catch at slip by AB de Villiers - who had missed the same batsman off the same bowler when Silva was on 17. On 10, Silva survived a chance at third slip when Alviro Petersen failed to hold on.

The bowler that time was a vastly improved Vernon Philander, who found more movement off the seam in the first spell yesterday than he did in all of the 26 he sent down in Galle and soon settled on a troubling length. “He’s not far from getting it together,” Donald said.

Steyn and Morne Morkel, too, were as rasping and miserly as the conditions allowed. Duminy also did his work well, and it was hard work.

The disappointment was Imran Tahir, who did not threaten until a more penetrative last spell. He also owes Elgar, SA’s resident man at short leg, a large drink for surviving most of his nine full tosses unscathed.

“The runs we scored off him were mostly from loose balls,” Silva said. “He bowls some good deliveries, but sometimes he’s not that accurate.”

For Sri Lanka, the big no-show was Kumar Sangakkara, who flapped at the first ball he faced - a rib-tickler from Steyn - and sent a simple catch looping to square leg.

For Donald, that only added to the quality of Jayawardene’s innings: “When you are two down and ‘Sanga’ has been bounced out first ball, you deserve a lot of credit for batting the way he did.”

Sangakkara’s home club is Nondescripts, located just 100m down the road from SSC. Nondescript was an apt description of his contribution yesterday.