WOOD TO PUNISH TOURISTS’ BUBBLE TROUBLE

SRI LANKA’S white-ball tour was plunged into further chaos when three players were sent home early for breaching team bubble restrictions.

Vice-captain Kusal Mendis, Niroshan Dickwella and Danushka Gunathilaka were suspended pending a full investigation into their appearance in Durham town centre on Sunday night.

In addition, England’s players may face a ban on families travelling to Australia for the Ashes, with the government taking tough measures in a bid to keep their cases low.

Should players be told that they must leave their families behind for the whole two-month tour, there is no guarantee that they will all travel. “I’m sure a lot of the players would have to think hard about that,” said fast bowler Mark Wood. “It would be hard to be without your young family for such a long period of time.

“With a young son, it’s a part of his life that’s very important to me, so it would be hard. But we’ll just have to see how it turns out.”

For now, Wood’s mind is on dishing out another defeat to the

Sri Lankans, who will be further weakened by the latest departures.

Their batting offered paper-thin resistance in the T20s and as they start the ODI series they will do well to contain the pace of Wood, who is thrilled to be playing in front of a local crowd of 7,500, even if Covid has played its part.

“We have to be a bit more vigilant here in Durham because cases are high and the rules are a bit more rigid,” said Wood

“But every time I come here I have a huge smile on my face, especially with England colours on. It’s a proud feeling.”

Malan, Bairstow (wkt), Root, Morgan (capt), Livingstone, Billings, S Curran, T Curran, Woakes, Rashid, Wood.

K Perera (capt, wk), Nissanka, O Fernando, Asalanka, De Silva, R Mendis, Shanaka, Hasaranga, Sandakan, Chameera, Pradeep. R Robinson, M Gough, (TV) R Kettleborough. 11am, live on Sky Sports.