Lanka on the ascendancy
Sri Lanka buried Bangladesh under a pile of runs after the third day's play of the second and final Test at the Chittagong Divisional Stadium yesterday.
There was no respite for the Tigers as the visitors stretched their lead to 472 with six more wickets still intact.
A 131-run unbeaten fifth wicket stand between Thilan Samaraweera (72) and first-innings centurion Tillakaratne Dilshan (81) guided the Lankans to finish the day on 296 for four but before that all the top-order batsmen made useful contributions to build up the innings on a pitch where it was not so easy to play shots.
The two undefeated batsmen made the home team bowlers helpless as they made merry in the last session to take their team into a commanding position, after the Tigers picked up four wickets in first two sessions.
Bangladesh once again got early success when Sri Lanka resumed their innings on 13 for no loss but the bowlers lacked application and failed to put pressure on the new batsman every time a wicket fell.
There were few appeals, two run out chances and one dropped catch but the Lankan batsmen hardly faced any trouble from the Bangladesh bowlers despite the fact they lost two quick wickets with the scoreboard reading 55 for 2.
Openers Malinda Warnapura and Prasanna Jayawardene began confidently but Bangladesh skipper Mohammad Ashraful had a golden arm to bring the first breakthrough for his side when the latter handed an easy catch to Shakib Al Hasan at short midwicket.
There was double delight for the home team when Shahadat Hossain trapped the other opener in front in the very next over but captain Mahela Jayawardene joined his deputy Kumar Sangakkara to steady the ship.
The pair played the remaining overs in the first session safely but after lunch left-arm spinner Enamul Haque broke the Sri Lankan skipper's heart as the right-hander offered a catch to Imrul Kayes at short-cover to make sure that there would be nothing special for him in his 100th Test match where his contribution in the first innings was 11 and 22 in his second knock.
Sangakkara however completed his fifty as the left-hander hit 54 off 104 balls with the help of four boundaries before he dragged one onto his stumps to become the second victim of Ashraful.
After that it was the story for Samaraweera and Dilshan. Both batsmen were however lucky as the former survived a very good run out chance which was missed by substitute fielder Rajin Saleh while the latter was dropped by Zunaed Siddiqui off Mashrafe Bin Mortaza.
Zunaed however suffered an injury in his thumb while trying to take the catch and left the field immediately. He was later declared fit.
There was another setback for the home side as main spinner Shakib could not bowl his full complement of overs as he had a cut in his finger.
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