Sri Lanka 186 for 2 (Jayawardene 77*, Sangakkara 67*) beat England
185 (Bopara 51, Root 42, A Mendis 3-33) by eight wickets
England suffered a humiliating defeat in their second One-Day International
in Sri Lanka, losing by eight wickets after being bowled out for just 185.
Mahela Jayawardene
and Kumar Sangakkara shared an unbeaten 149-run stand for Sri Lanka’s third
wicket to give the hosts a two-nil lead in the series.
Another questionable
display from England’s top-order resulted in the visitors falling to 37/3 after
choosing to bat first.
England's recovery
started with Joe Root, who made 42 before he was out lbw to Angelo Matthews at
117/5.
The visitors most
significant contribution came from Ravi Bopara and his second fifty of the
series, a more cultured approach than his previous innings, guided England
towards a more substantial total.
But as batsmen came
and went, Bopara's cause became compromised and he soon fell to Ajantha Mendis
shortly after reaching his half-century, which came off 66 balls with a
solitary boundary.
When the hosts
began their chase of 186, England's efforts were proven to be worse than first
imagined despite claiming two early wickets.
A breakthrough for
Steven Finn removed Kusal Perera at 27/1 and then Moeen Ali removed the other
Sri Lankan opener, Tilikaratne Dilshan, for 26.
But from then on it
was an exhibition; a perfect example of how to bat in Sri Lanka from two of the
finest batsmen to have been produced by the host nation.
Jaywardene and
Sangakkara made England's meager total seem shameful and the pair were able to
knock-off the winning runs with 10.4 overs to spare, in a game which had been
reduced to 45 overs per side.
England's batting
has been under greater examination than ever in previous years.
The changing of the
Head Coach and the batting coach, as well as the removal of a certain Kevin
Pietersen, has not been able to resolve inconsistencies which, once again, left
England with an uphill struggle.
Moeen Ali came
crashing back to reality with a single-figure score after his century in the
first ODI and Alastair Cook's (22) top-edge rewarded Dilshan with the wicket of
both England openers.
Ian Bell's place in
the one-day team has been questioned a lot recently and, despite receiving his
150th cap in the format, a score of 11 failed to silence his critics
as he handed Rangana Herath (1-40) his first and only wicket.
Cook’s wicket made
the score 37/3 and after an aggressive approach against the spin, the visitors
retreated to a more civil manner of finding runs.
Eoin Morgan (16)
and Root led an initial recovery before the former fell with the score at 75/4
to Thisara Perera.
Root, now joined by
Bopara, sought to salvage what he could from this inadequate start to the
innings adding 42 runs for the fifth wicket.
But the fact that
this was the highest partnership of the innings was, in itself, a signifier of
how badly England had applied themselves, losing wickets at regular intervals
after Root was removed.
England went on to
lose their final six wickets for 67 runs, with Bopara accounting for the majority of
these runs after Jos Buttler (7) and Chris Woakes (15) failed to support the
Essex all-rounder.
Now on 173/7,
Bopara's approach began to change, having run out of accomplished batting
partners, but this led to him being caught off Mendis, who finished with
figures of 3-33.
Mendis claimed the
wicket of Finn as Sri Lanka took their second wicket with the score on 180 and Dhammika
Prasad (2-16) wrapped up the innings by bowling Harry Gurney for a duck.
The visitors had
been bowled out in 43 of their 45 overs with a severely below-par score, a
score which was made to look even more embarrassing when two of the worlds
greats combined to humble England.
A 15th ODI hundred partnership
between Jayawardene and Sangakkara, who have 815 ODI caps between them,
demonstrated the extent of England’s deficiencies in this format.
England have now
lost 15 of their last 22 completed ODI's against Test-playing opposition and,
if success papers over cracks, there are major holes in England's one-day
technique.
Make no mistake,
the quality of some players is difficult to plan for, but when your own side is
lacking in quality, it can be easy for the opposition to dominate and in this
match England were outplayed in all capacities.
The series
continues on Wednesday in Hambantota.
