Dhananjaya having second thoughts on spinning tracks at home as they were easily trounced at home against Australia.
Dhananjaya de Silva says it’s worth thinking about not playing on tracks this spin-friendly at home.
Historically, Sri Lanka has used spin to defeat visiting teams, and the Galle surface is particularly infamous for its quick turns. However, Australia has now given Sri Lanka the greatest Test loss in its history, followed by a nine-wicket loss in back-to-back Test matches in Galle.
Since 2020, Sri Lanka has played 19 home Test matches, 15 of which have taken place in Galle. Of those 15, Sri Lanka has won eight and lost seven, and they have also been defeated at this location by England and Pakistan. However, because of their lacklustre performance there, Sri Lanka has long been hesitant to play at P Sara Oval in Colombo.
“There’s definitely a question of whether [we] are playing spin very well as batters,” he said after Sri Lanka lost the second Test in Galle by nine wickets. “We’ll have to rethink that. If you looked at how they played, they scored a lot of runs square [of the wicket], and understood that it’s hard to defend on these pitches. We couldn’t apply that ourselves with the pressure that they put on us. We have to think about whether we keep playing on pitches like this, or on pitches better suited to us.”
“As a batter, I do like playing in the other venues because my records there are better,” he said. “If you take our batting averages, they’re lower than those of batters in other countries, and you can see why that is – because we bat in spin-friendly conditions.
“It’s hard to have an outstanding record on these pitches. But bowlers have to be very skillful to get wickets on good tracks too. Still, I think it’s worth thinking about.”