An unbeaten 152 by Chamara Silva put Sri Lanka firmly in command of the second cricket Test yesterday as New Zealand were set an improbable 504 to win.
The home side now require a world-record fourth innings score for victory after Sri Lanka were dismissed for 365 in their second innings.
Batting to save the game and protect a 1-0 series lead, New Zealand made a positive start to reach 56 without loss before openers Jamie How and Craig Cumming fell in quick succession.
PHOTO: AP
Mathew Sinclair was not out 10 with Stephen Fleming on four when bad light brought an early end to the day with New Zealand at 75 for two, leaving them needing another 429 runs with two days remaining.
Silva put the embarrassment of a double duck in the first Test behind him to produce his maiden Test century following his 61 in the first innings.
He was at the crease for five-and-a-half hours and hit 20 boundaries as Sri Lanka built a dominant total until Daniel Vettori cleaned up the last three wickets in the space of four balls, finishing with seven for 130, his 13th five-for in Test cricket.
The 27-year-old Silva put his name in the record books by becoming the first player in Test history to score a century in his first game after a pair of ducks.
When play began after rain wiped out the first 40 minutes of the third morning, Silva and Prasanna Jayawardene added 37 runs before the new ball came into play and Chris Martin took the only wicket of the morning.
Jayawardene pulled a short-pitched Martin ball to the boundary, and was suckered into the same shot two deliveries later, spooning the ball straight to the substitute fielder at square-leg to be out for 37.
Chaminda Vaas joined Silva to add 88 for the seventh wicket before Vaas edged Vettori to wicket-keeper Brendon McCullum to be out for 47.
How and Cumming were untroubled as they set about the run chase for New Zealand until the 15th over, when How was baffled by a Malinga delivery which trapped him leg before wicket for 33.
Cumming followed eight balls later for 20 when he nicked a ball from Muttiah Muralitharan to Kumar Sangakkara behind the stumps.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier