Sri Lanka wins the last match and the test series after a great fight back - Sri Lanka’s tour of England till the final test match has been a dream run. The visitors managed to win it all in the tournament so far. The last test match win in the tour would have surely meant a 100% successful tour for the team. While the Home team who have recently came across as a good test team at home would have loved to save the series.
England won the toss and they decided to bowl first. Just like the first test this test also proved to be a swinging ship. The match swinged from one end to another due to some great fight back from the teams. Batting first the visitors faulted in bowling conditions. Day 1 saw some great bowling from the English bowlers. At the score of 50 Sri Lanka lost both the openers leaving Kumar Sangakkara and Mahela Jayawardene on the crease. Both the veterans scored a 50 run partnership to take their team across the 100 run mark. The home side got two consecutive successes as Jayawardene and Lahiru Thirimane felt on 108. Small partnership between Sangakkara, Angelo Mathews and Dinesh Chandimal took the team to a score of 257. Sangakkara was the top scorer in the first innings scoring 79 runs while Liam Plunkett with his 5 wickets made sure that his team has an upper hand in the match.
Day 2 saw England taking the lead in the match as the batsman made merry scoring runs easily. Sam Robson scored a century while Garry Ballance and Ian Bell scored half centuries. The English side ended up the day scoring 320 runs losing 6 wickets. England’s 1st innings ended up at a score of 365 with Robson the highest scorer of the innings. He scored 127 runs while Shamminda Eranga and Angelo Mathews took 4 wickers each.
Day 3 saw a fight back from the Sri Lankan side. The visitors lost only 4 wickets by the end of day 3. While they lost 4 wickets but they also managed to take a healthy lead in the match. Dimuth Karunaratne managed to score 45 runs. Sangakkara and Jayawardene yet again showed their worth as both the batsmen managed to score half centuries for the team. The visiting side managed to score a huge total of 457. The second innings saw Mathews scored 160 runs while Rangana Herath the tailender scored 48 runs. The home side was managed set a target of 350 for winning the test match and the series. Plunkett yet again was the highest wicket taker in the innings as he took 4 wickets taking the tally to 9 in a match.
After some great batting performance the Sri Lankan bowlers too performed well in the second innings taking some wickets pretty early. By the end of day 4 the home side had already lost half of the team at a score of 57. In the last day of the match the visitors needed only 5 wickets more to win the series. But the late resistance from the young batsman Moeen Ali managed to take the match to the last ball of the match. He scored 108 runs but the end was inevitable as England was bowled out a score of 249. Dhammika Prasad managed to take 5 wickets in the innings. With this win the visitors
won the two match series with 1-0. Angelo Mathews was awarded the man of the match title for his all-round performance. James Anderson and Angelo Mathews were awarded the man of the series prize.