THE Sri Lankans, having finished their first innings with an imposing total, must surely be in a comfort zone and in position to press home the advantage of batting first and then keeping the home team in the field for almost two days to drain them out.

They owe this obviously to their middle-order and lower order batsmen who kept the innings going despite the best efforts put in by the Pakistan bowlers on a slow and an unhelpful wicket on which the Sri Lankan batsmen preferred to occupy the crease for as long as possible.

They fulfilled the job not only with authority but with success to make the Pakistan bowling grind which also was helped, undoubtedly, by a couple of requested reviews which were turned down in the visitors’ favour.

But that is surely is no excuse for Pakistan’s lack of success with the ball because the harder they tried to keep the visiting batsmen in check, the tougher resistance they met with the Sri Lankan captain Dinesh Chandimal leading the charge to score his ninth Test century and the first as the captain of his country.

His 134 runs partnership for the fifth wicket with Niroshan Dickwella who made an enterprising 83 and another valuable contribution for the sixth wicket by Dilruwan Perera were indeed the highlight of the day.

In the recent past, with the exit of their two greats of the game in Mahela Jayawardene and Kumar Sangakkara, Sri Lanka’s graph at the international level has suddenly dipped, which is always the case with every team in such a situation.

Pakistan is also in the same boat after the departure of the indomitable Misbah-ul-Haq and Younis Khan who left with honour and with a record just as impressive as that of Jayawardene or Sangakkara.

Their present captain Chandimal, though, looks a good enough candidate to fill in the shoes of his great predecessors. He is a gutsy, disciplined, skillful and intelligent batsman to suss out the situation and guide the innings accordingly. Hi fine unbeaten innings of 155, in the final reckoning, could be a handful for Pakistan unless Sarfraz Ahmed and his men show up with as much application.

Gaping cracks have started to appear on this dull track and also the odd delivery has started to keep low. That, no doubt, will have a bearing on the way Pakistan batsmen handle the Sri Lankan attack which on paper appears to be a lot more balanced than Pakistan which has gone in with three pacers in the match.

Published in Dawn, September 30th, 2017