Gary Kirsten wants surfaces where Sri Lanka seamers ‘can win games’ as well

Where in the past 15 years Sri Lanka have at times prepared ranks dustbowls at home, head coach Gary Kirsten wants surfaces more like those seen in the Test series against India.

Across both teams, seamers took 24 of the total 67 wickets taken by bowlers in this series – a share of roughly 36%. For Sri Lanka, Asitha Fernando was the top wicket-taker (and second overall in the series), with ten dismissals at an average of 20. The tracks were good for batting too, with each team making three hundreds apiece (three for Sonal Dinusha, two for Devdutt Padikkal, one for Dhruv Jurel). Both Tests also went into the fifth day, when previous series in Sri Lanka have sometimes been characterised by their quick finishes owing to spinners running through batting orders on dusty surfaces.

Kirsten made the case that “hard-working” tracks create hard-working cricketers – players who develop the skills and patience to prosper in this format.

“I’m a big fan of making sure that we don’t prepare wickets just for spinners,” Kirsten said. “We want to prepare wickets where we can win games with our seamers as well. That’s how you develop a cricket team – playing in all conditions. I was very impressed with the two wickets that were prepared for the Test series. They were hard-working Test wickets – not straightaway result wickets.

“We wanted our batters to be able to bat. Spinners have to work hard, and seamers are in the game. In the second innings at Galle, our seamers took seven of the ten wickets. I’m very encouraged that our seamers are in the game, and I certainly want to develop that more.”

Kirsten heaped particular praise on Fernando, who has been the lead seamer in Sri Lanka’s attack for years now. At 29, he likely has plenty of cricket left in him. But there is the question of seam-bowling support for him. Lahiru Kumara, Sri Lanka’s only other quick, took three wickets at 57.33 in this series.

“He’s a world-class bowler, and he’s been bowling really well this series,” Kirsten said of Asitha. “He’s been on top of his game. But we do need more assistance for him – we can’t just rely on him. That’s something we’re going to spend a lot of time working on is just understanding how we can get 20 wickets and not just rely on spin.”

Sri Lanka’s breakout star of the series was Sonal Dinusha, however. Kirsten said of his fifth-day rearguard hundred at the SSC, that that innings would go down as one of the best in Sri Lanka’s history.

“This innings, what he was able to achieve on day four and day five, I would say [it] would go down in Sri Lankan Test cricket history as one of the great saves,” Kirsten said. “Forget the fact that he got a hundred in the first innings as well and was able to do this. I think it was a great example to a lot of cricketers in the country as to what you can do at Test match level against a really good bowling attack, following on in a tough situation.

“I think it’s never easy batting at six in a team because often you come in under pressure. What I was encouraged by was when I watched him in the West Indies, I saw that he really thrives in the tough situations. I love the way he plays Test cricket. He thinks about it. He plays to his strengths and he is a smart cricketer. He understands what the bowlers are trying to do to him and then he uses his skill sets to negate that.”

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