A Break or Two

After the excitement of the Cardiff test, (where despite almost persistent rain - who’s bright idea was it to play a test match in Wales, in May? - Sri Lanka capitulated on the final afternoon and were all out for 82), the Lords Test Match seemed rather dull. Despite a couple of breaks - Dilshan’s thumb and a pavilion window (is anyone actually buying the story that Matt Prior’s bat ‘accidentally’ set off an avalanche of the said item, resulting in shattered glass and the cut ankle of an MCC member? No, me neither. The more likely story is that, after having had to endure Alastair Cook plod his way to yet another century and then being told it was his job to up the ante - a ploy which resulted in him being run out for four - Prior got back to the dressing room in a fit of anger and threw something straight at the window. Simple.) - nothing else really happened.

As already mentioned, Cook reached another milestone, Prior (before his break) also played well

for a century and Dilshan (also before his break) was sublime, as he notched up the highest score by a Sri Lankan at Lords. While the batsmen then, (with the exception of the first mornings play) looked competent, England’s bowling giants (the tallest in Test Match history, with a combined height of 9 feet, eight inches) struggled to find the right line and length. While the inclusion of Steven Finn seems to have vindicated itself with his ‘four-for’, having three tall, ‘hit-the-deck’ bowlers seemed a bit, well, samey. With Lords typically being one of the most productive grounds for swing bowling, one cannot help but wander if England may have been better off including Jade Dernbach or Ajmal Shazad in their squad? While this is of course all hindsight, when you add yet even more rain into the mix (OK, so Wales isn’t the only place to receive wet weather) and the cautious nature of Strauss and Flower, a draw always seemed the mostly likely option. Sri Lanka’s bating is too good to let another spectacular collapse happen again; though their ‘heavyweights’ in the form of Jayewardene and Sangakkara, could do with some runs.

Let’s hope that down at The Rose Bowl the sun is shinning, the cricket is exciting and the windows remain intact.