IT’S A SOGGY EXCUSE OF A SERIES!
Morgan’s men win again but weather spoils it
IT MAY be yet another series victory for what is becoming England’s best ever one-day side but there will be little they can learn moving towards the World Cup from the rain-ruined farce being played out in Sri Lanka.
Yesterday saw a fourth one-day international out of four affected by the monsoon season on this beautiful island and while it was a third win for England, it was the second decided by the DuckworthLewis-Stern calculation.
Together with a win in what became a 21- over match it was enough to give Eoin Morgan’s side a 3-0 lead with just Tuesday’s final match in Colombo to come in this sorry, soggy excuse of a series. Take out that one-off loss to Scotland in June and that’s nine one-day series wins in a row.
The heaviest rain yet came with England well placed to pull off their highest run-chase in Sri Lanka at 132 for two from 27 overs in pursuit of the home side’s competitive 273 for seven in what Morgan described as a ‘scrappy’ match.
It was predictable, too, with the heavens opening at exactly the same point in late afternoon as they did in all the other matches, the only saving grace being that a day game at least allowed a reasonable amount of cricket.
There is no doubt England were again worthy winners, with Morgan and Joe Root ensuring they kept ahead of the required rate with measured batting after the mystery spin of Akila Dananjaya had accounted for Alex Hales
(right) and Jason Roy. But the futility of the exercise was summed up by Sportsmail columnist Nasser Hussain who, commentating for Sky, called t he decision to stage this series in the rainiest month of the Sri Lankan calendar ‘ridiculous.’
‘ We have to look at the future tours programme,’ added Hussain. ‘Whenever there is a month without cricket the game insists on filling it with yet another series but this is not good enough. England shouldn’t be here at this time of year.’
The last time England were in Sri Lanka for a one-day series — and that was closer to Christmas — was four years ago when they lost 5-2 so this at least is a measure of how far they have come with a home World Cup looming. It is a measure, too, of how far Sri Lanka have fallen and the shambolic state of their cricket both on and off the field was summed up by a key moment when they should have dismissed Root and maybe gone on to win the match.
Root swept a gentle full-toss f rom Dhananjaya de Silva straight to Lasith Malinga at short fine leg with the storm clouds building and the need to stay on the right side of the DLS calculation becoming acute.
But square leg umpire Lyndon Hannibal quickly realised that Sri Lanka did not have their required five fielders in the circle, the inexperienced Kasun Rajitha having dopily remained at long off rather than come into the ring.
Yet England were again the better side, their superiority summed up by the sight of Moeen Ali out-bowling and gaining far more turn that any of the home spinners.
Moeen was the pick of the attack, with his spin-twin and great friend Adil Rashid almost as effective in conditions in which England have traditionally struggled both in the bowling and playing of spin.
England really should have given Joe Denly’s wrist-spin an early outing or picked Sam Curran to take pace off the ball but they wanted to give more experience to Olly Stone and this became a tough but useful exercise for him. Hales was one fringe player who was given a chance thanks to a twisted ankle suffered by Jonny Bairstow playing on Friday in one of the football sessions that England love so much and are very reluctant to give up. But Hales was unable to take it both with the bat and in the field. He strayed in a couple of yards from the boundary while fielding and dropped Dasun Shanaka off Rashid to hand him one of his five sixes in a run a ball 66 ended only by a woeful run out symptomatic of Sri Lanka’s struggles. Then Hales was the victim of a sharp stumping by Niroshan Dickwella that could have been avoided had he not carelessly lifted his heel out of his crease. Hales will get another chance on Tuesday, with Bairstow unlikely to recover in time, but England have no plans to bring an end to t heir f ootball sessions, coach Trevor Bayliss reckoning t he advantages outweigh the risks. It is hard to argue with that or anything else this impressive oneday side do.