AUS vs SL 1st Test: Great bowling by Lyon and Head, Australia beat Sri Lanka by 10 wickets

Australia vs Sri Lanka 1st Test: The result of the first Test played between Sri Lanka and the visiting Australian team came out on the morning of the third day itself. Australia’s team defeated the hosts Sri Lanka by 10 wickets on the third day on the basis of their two players – Travis Head (4 wickets) and Nathan Lyon (4 wickets).

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In this first test match, Sri Lanka were reduced to 212 runs in the first innings after winning the toss and elected to bat. Australia started playing 313 for eight in the first innings on the third day. Fast bowler Asitha Fernando made Pat Cummins (26) the victim of his yorker. He then dismissed Mitchell Swepson (01) with an in-swinger to end the Australian innings for 321. Thus Australia were ahead by 109 runs on the basis of the first innings.

Nathan Lyon havoc

Sri Lanka’s team could only manage 113 runs in the second innings, leaving Australia a target of five runs to win and David Warner finished the match in four balls. The improvised off-spinner Head took four wickets in 17 balls to take four wickets for 10 runs. He took only one wicket in the last 26 Test matches. Lyon continued his good form with five wickets for 90 runs in the first innings and four wickets for 31 runs in the second innings.

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Sri Lanka made a quick start in the second innings on a spin-friendly pitch with the intention of quickly ending Australia’s first innings lead. Sri Lankan openers Dimuth Karunaratne and Pathum Nisanka added 17 runs off Mitchell Starc in the very first over, which included four fours.
But Lyon broke the 37-run partnership by getting Karunaratne (23) caught by wicketkeeper Alex Carey. Two runs later, leg-spinner Mitchell Swepson dismissed Nisanka (14) leg before.

Result determined like this

Kusal Mendis and Oshada Fernando added 20 runs for the third wicket. But Mendis touched the ball with the ball and was caught at square leg. Fernando (12) also reached the pavilion by catching Steve Smith standing in the slips on the ball of Swepson and Sri Lanka’s score was 63 for four. Dhananjay de Silva and Dinesh Chandimal added 32 runs for the fifth wicket. But Head took two wickets in his very first over which almost decided the result.

Head dismissed Dhananjay de Silva after Chandimal (13). Cameron Green (77) and Umman Khawaja (71) scored half-centuries in Australia’s first innings. Off-spinner Ramesh Mendis took four wickets for 107 runs. Niroshan Dickwella scored 58 in Sri Lanka’s first innings.