Marlon Samuels dismissed Dimuth Karunaratne 14 short of a double-hundred to bring West Indies a small moment of respite in a session that was otherwise all Sri Lanka's. The wicket only came after Karunaratne and Dinesh Chandimal, who brought up his fifth Test hundred, had stretched their partnership to 238, the highest for the third wicket in Galle. Sri Lanka were 344 for 3 at lunch on the second day, with Chandimal batting on 113.
The wicket was a result of the slowness of the pitch, which Karunaratne had dealt with expertly till then, picking the right lengths to drive and even then refusing to go hard at the ball. For once he jabbed at the ball, a short one from Samuels that stopped on him, and ended up lobbing a return catch to the offspinner. Till then a double-hundred seemed inevitable, with West Indies' four fast bowlers unsuited to the surface and their one frontline spinner, Devendra Bishoo, too inaccurate to make use of the turn on offer.
West Indies' fielding compounded their misery. On day one, when Chandimal was on 11, Jerome Taylor put him down, a relatively straightforward chance as he backtracked from mid-on. On the second morning, they let him off again. In the tenth over of the day, Chandimal slapped a short ball from Shannon Gabriel to backward point, where Jermaine Blackwood spilled the ball after getting both hands to the overhead chance. Chandimal was on 84 at that point.
The ball was only 10 overs old when play resumed, but the was little of the seam movement that had been in evidence on the first morning. The runs came at a good clip, with Karunaratne pulling Jerome Taylor to the square leg boundary in the fifth over of the morning before driving him through mid-off for another four to bring up his 150.
At the other end Kemar Roach, bowling without either the seam movement or the pace he generated on the first day, conceded two fours in two overs to Chandimal. Taylor and Roach went out of the attack, and Gabriel, who replaced Roach, saw an edge from Karunaratne fly through the vacant slip area before Blackwood put down Chandimal. In his next over, Gabriel produced the only other moment of discomfort for a Sri Lankan batsman in the session when he straightened one past Chandimal's edge.
Chandimal was not unduly deterred. Following Bishoo's introduction, he stepped down the track and whipped him away wide of mid-on, and in the next over flat-batted Gabriel over extra cover to bring up his hundred. It was his second in a row at the venue, after his match-turning 162* against India two months ago.
(espncricinfo)
