All in all Lord’s, buzzing in its best shirtsleeve finery, was given a jaunty start to the Test match summer. England wickets fell in the morning, too many of them for comfort but the runs came too with an urgency unfortunately not matched by the Sri Lanka over rate which, particularly in the first session, was beyond sluggish.
England, put in by Angelo Mathews (Alastair Cook would have batted in any case) went some way towards translating fine words about more-enterprising cricket into deeds. However, until Joe Root, with his third Test hundred and second at Lord’s, and Matt Prior, on what is already a robust return to the colours, collaborated in a terrific sixth-wicket partnership that occupied most of the final session, no one had been able to produce what might be called a defining innings.
Sense of purpose
Sense of purpose and freedom of expression are all well and good, and bright cameos are attractive to watch – no more so than those first from Ian Bell (56) and then by Moeen Ali (48) – but on their own they rarely win Test matches on good batting pitches against an industrious but modest attack.
One or both of that pair had played themselves into an excellent position to capitalise, impetuosity the downfall for Moeen who had hitherto played not just fluently off his legs but with restraint when Sri Lanka, noting his strength through the legside, packed the offside field and bowled wide of his off stump.
By the close England, 74 for three following the pre-lunch dismissals of Sam Robson, Cook and Gary Ballance, had established a reasonable although not yet secure position, Root and Prior having added 135 in little more than 30 overs.
Root had batted with serenity over five hours for his unbeaten 102 while Prior, a predictable counterpoint with something to prove – such was the clamour for Jos Buttler to have his place instead – played with all the bristle of a retired colonel’s moustache and will resume on 76.
If Root creamed his eight boundaries, apparently reunited now with the footwork that had gone absent without leave in Australia, then Prior flayed and clobbered the nine he hit. As the Sri Lanka bowlers began to flag the pair scampered their runs, even into the final over of the day, in a manner that has not characterised the England batting for some considerable while, helter-skelter at times, testing Prior’s rehabilitated Achilles to the full.
Torrid time
Neither Root nor Prior had played in England’s last Test, in Sydney, such had been the torrid time endured in Australia. So this was redemption for both. Root looked uncertain at first, although he was off the mark by driving beautifully to the extra cover boundary. In the winter the Australian seamers had tormented him, forcing him back in the crease and then sucking him in with fuller deliveries.
Mathews does not have such bowling nous and skill at his disposal, however: this was a chanceless effort on a pitch that had visibly lost its green tinge by lunch and demanded runs. When on 45 he became the fifth youngest England batsman to reach 1,000 Test runs, behind only Cook, David Gower, Mike Atherton and Sir Len Hutton.
For his part Prior may, in the dressing room clamour after play, have reflected on the slender margin by which careers can hang.
Stretching a long way forward to his second ball, from the left-arm spinner Rangana Herath, he saw it elude his inside edge, miss his front pad and instead cannon into his trailing leg. Herath thought he had his man but the umpire, Paul Reiffel, believed otherwise.
The Sri Lankans asked for the decision to be reviewed and after an agonising wait it was deemed that the ball, although it would have hit the stumps full on, had struck Prior, by no more than a smidgeon, outside the line of off stump: Reiffel’s decision stood. Prior made sure it counted. Guardian Service
