Sangakkara can cash in on a tricky wicket at Dambulla

England Cricket / Ed Hawkins / 29 September 2007 / Leave a Comment

The Racing Post's Ed Hawkins tells us why the openers are doomed for failure at Dambulla as England take on Sri Lanka in the ODI Series

THE wicket at the Rangiri International Stadium has the same characteristics of Dambulla, the city which hosts three of the five one-day internationals between Sri Lanka and England will be played: agricultural.

It is flat enough but looking at the records it is perhaps surprising to see that it has not been ploughed or suffers from a furrow on a length. Or in other words, it's not very good.

The stadium is famous for being built in just 167 days and batsmen on both sides could be forgiven for wishing they had spent a bit longer and taken a bit more care on it. The willowmen may be relieved to head to Colombo for the final two matches.

The average first innings score in 20 matches is just 198, a statistic which will cheer England more than the hosts given they fear Sri Lanka's powerful batting line-up.

Although having said that, England were bowled out for just 143 in the first game played there in 2001 while two years later they were skittled for just 88.

They have not been the only side to suffer, however. In the first six matches no side posted more than 200 batting first and in all matches only three outfits have scored 250 or more.

The reason for the low scores is that wickets historically take time to bed in at new grounds and the surroundings of the stadium favour fast bowlers.

The Dambulla reservoir is visible from the ground and with the water table predictably high, the ball swings more.
Spin bowlers do not mind it, either. Locals say the surface will sweat and then crumble.

Indeed the consistently poor nature of the wicket is highlighted by the toss record. There is no bias whatsoever with triumphs split evenly between matches batting first and second.

If the wicket assisted swing early on and then stopped, far more teams would have been successful batting second.

The best way to make money from this knowledge is to play the top runscorer markets.

Top order batsmen have traditionally struggled at the venue and it could be wise to look at numbers four to seven to fill the coffers.

In all matches, opening batsmen have top scored 22 per cent of the time, which is way below the historical average of around 35 per cent for all internationals over the last three years.

Numbers one to three account for 33 per cent of top scorers while the value is clear for numbers four to six with an impressive 53 per cent outscoring their team-mates.

The batsman coming in at No 4 has proved to be the most successful, top scoring ten times. Mahela Jayawardene and Kevin Pietersen are expected to fill the position for Sri Lanka and England respectively.

Jayawardene has the best record of any of the Sri Lanka top four in Dambulla, with an average of 40 after posting three half centuries. Sanath Jayasuriya averages 27, Upul Tharanga five (he has played two matches) and Kumar Sangakkara 32.
With the three matches at Dambulla all under lights it is worth looking at the records of teams and batsmen with the beams switched on.

Again there is an even split on the toss result for ten matches while the trend of the top order failing continues. Only two openers have top scored - and one of those was Jayasuriya after England had been embarrassed for that paltry total in 2003.