QUEENSTOWN: Niroshan Dickwella made an unbeaten 63 and Dimuth Karunaratne and Lahiru Thirimanne also compiled half centuries as Sri Lanka drew their two-day match against a New Zealand Chairman’s XI on Monday.

The match at the Queens­town Events Center offered Sri Lanka’s only preparation in New Zealand conditions before the first Test of a two-match series starts at Christchurch on Friday.

Thirmanne made 50 in Sri Lanka’s first innings of 173-9 declared and, after the home team had been dismissed for 125, the tourists declared at 261-8 in their second innings, led by Dickwella and Karu­na­ratne who retired on 52.

Touring captain Angelo Mathews had scores of 0 and 19 and Kumar Sangakkara made 1 and 29.

Published in Dawn December 23th , 2014