England captain Buttler won the toss and chose to bat. They made several changes in the eleven of the last match. Chris Woakes returned, Liam Livingstone started brilliantly, Bairstow and Buttler. But the opening pair did not last long. After the loss of the first wicket, the breakdown of England’s batting was evident. Joe Root, Jonny Bairstow, and Jos Buttler-all are brief guests at the crease today. Angelo Mathews has been replaced in the Sri Lanka squad as Mathisha Pathirana has been ruled out. Experienced Mathews changed the picture of Sri Lankan bowling as soon as he got on the field. He bowled flawlessly and inspired his fellow bowlers. Despite a desperate fight from Ben Stokes at four, England’s scoreboard remained stuck at 156 runs.
Earlier, England was seen to fail with the bat against Afghanistan, and South Africa. The picture did not change against Sri Lanka today. The beginning of the day was not bad for them. Chinnaswamy’s twenty-two-yard batting is helpful, big runs are seen here. Jonny Bairstow and David Malan also started well. But in the third ball of the seventh over, England lost wickets against the pace of play. Malan returns to Angelo Mathews. He scored 28 off 25 balls. After that England kept losing wickets regularly. Joe Root was run out for 3 runs off 10 balls. Bairstow was also dismissed by Kasun Rajitha. He scored 30 runs off 31 balls. Although the start was good, he could not prolong the innings once more.
England lost their third wicket for 67 runs. A big pair was needed to turn around. But there the world champions of 2019 failed. Captain Jos Buttler returned with 8 runs off Lahiru Kumara. Back in the first XI today, Liam Livingstone collected only 1. Moeen Ali did not get a run. Bangalore is his familiar ground, he once played for Royal Challengers Bangalore. But today it was not possible for him to score more than 15 runs in 15 balls. Angelo Mathews showed him the way to Sajghar after returning for the second spell. Chris Woakes was also brought back into the XI by coach Matthew Mott to boost the batting power. He returned to the dressing room after playing 4 balls for zero runs. Kasun is the victim of Rajitha.
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