Dimuth Karunaratne smashed his maiden double Test ton, and Dhananjaya de Silva batted recorded his second 150+ score in Test cricket as Sri Lanka went through a day without losing a wicket on day four. The Bangladesh bowlers toiled really hard, but the hosts are now just 29 runs away from Bangladesh’s first innings total of 541.
Dimuth Karunaratne and Dhananjaya de Silva just batted on and on and on. The Karunaratne-de Silva duo shared a mammoth 322-run stand (unbeaten) for the fourth wicket. The Bangladesh bowlers toiled really hard but just couldn’t get the breakthroughs.
Only 76 overs were possible on the fourth day as bad light forced the umpires to take early stumps. But that was enough for the two overnight batters to smash massive hundreds to put Sri Lanka in a position of strength. The hosts racked up 283 runs in the day and only trail Bangladesh by 29 runs.
The first session saw the two batters get to their immediate milestones. Sri Lankan skipper Karunaratne registered his 11th Test hundred before de Silva brought up his 15th score of 50+ in Test cricket. The Sri Lankan pair scored at a decent clip as they scored 102 runs in the extended first session, which saw Bangladesh send in 31 overs.
While there was some sort of discipline from the Bangladesh bowlers, they could barely create any chances. Not a lot was happening off the pitch as well as Karunaratne and de Silva cashed in big time.
Soon after lunch, de Silva hit a flurry of boundaries to reach his 7th Test hundred. Sri Lanka scored 37 runs in the first five overs in the second session, and 30 of those came from de Silva’s bat. The off-spinning all-rounder did slow down a touch after his hundred while Karunaratne brought up his 150. The hosts plundered 111 runs in the second session and were once again wicketless. Karunaratne remained unbeaten on 184 while de Silva reached 134, not out.
The runs continued to flow after the Tea interval, which was a bit of a stop and start one. 40 minutes into the third session, the umpires deemed the light wasn’t good enough for play. They took the players off for about half an hour before the conditions got better.
In the second over after the resumption of play, Karunaratne first went past this highest Test score of 196 and finally brought up his maiden double hundred as he struck a couple of boundaries in one over off Taskin Ahmed. The Karunaratne-de Silva duo upped the ante and scored 45 runs in 10 overs after bad light had intervened. In the process, de Silva recorded his second 150+ score in Test cricket.
Just when the pair were cutting loose and looked all set to go past Bangladesh’s first innings score of 541, bad light stopped playing again. The umpires hung around for about half an hour and waited for the conditions to improve. But it wasn’t to be as stumps were taken early, and play was called off 53 minutes before the scheduled close of play.
Sri Lanka reached 512/3 at the end of day four. Karunaratne ended the day on 234 while de Silva reached 154 as Sri Lanka dominated proceedings on day four. Barring Mehidy Hasan Miraz, most Bangladesh bowlers conceded runs heavily, and there wasn’t a lot of control or consistency.
Brief Scores
Sri Lanka 512/3 (Karunaratne 234*, de Silva 154*, Taskin 1/91) trail Bangladesh 541/7 decl (Shanto 163, Mominul 127, Tamim 90, Rahim 68*, Fernando 4/96) by 29 runs
