Sri Lanka aim to break Kandy bogey in second Test

For Sri Lanka this is familiar territory - a thumping victory in Galle followed by an opportunity to seal the series in the hills of Kandy. Against England and South Africa, though, they blew that chance in dramatic fashion. With the second Test due to start on Wednesday they are only too aware of their inglorious record at this ground in the past twelve months.

"We have been down this path before," said coach Dav Whatmore after morning practice. "Recent history is not kind, but we have to try and change that in this game."

Whatmore was unable to pinpoint a specific reason for their failure against South Africa and England: "There are varying causes, but we have found that the opposition has comeback at us pretty hard after we won at Galle. There were periods in both games when we required a little extra fight, but lost wickets and let the opposition back into the game.

"We will not be focusing on those two results, however, as that would distract us from what we have to do to win this game," he revealed.

Sri Lankan captain Sanath Jayasuriya was confident: "The batsmen are batting well and the bowlers are also in good form. If we play like we did in Galle then there is no reason why we should not win here too."

Jayasuriya, though, expects India to comeback hard: "They must realise what they did wrong in the last game. We expect them to come and bowl a better line and length in this game and we will therefore have to show more patience."

Sri Lanka though will have no better opportunity to break their Kandy bogey (Sri Lanka have only won two out of the 11 Tests played in Kandy) and win their first Test series for 16 months. India have been ravaged by a spate of injuries and without four key players - Tendulkar (toe), Laxman (knee), Kumble (shoulder), and Srinath (hand) - their confidence looks as frail as the rickety corrugated iron roofs that are being hastily installed at Asgiriya Stadium.

Indian captain Sourav Ganguly remained upbeat: "It's bad luck to lose five of our players, but we have to do the best with what we have. You have to look at it positively - we might find a couple of good players from this.

"Morale is actually good. We have not lost a Test series for a year now, so there is no reason to be down," he said. "We have been in this situation before and have bounced back. You never know in this game and we just have to keep fighting."

Coach John Wright was crystal clear: "The key to this game is that we have to score runs in the first innings and then put the Sri Lankan batting under pressure. That is what this game is all about; withstanding the pressure applied by the opposition and applying pressure onto the opposition."

India have therefore tinkered with the batting line-up. Rahul Dravid, who scored an unbeaten 61 in the first Test and looked by far the best Indian batsmen, has been promoted to number three while Ganguly, who has not scored a Test fifty in his last 12 innings and candidly admits that he has been "looking forward to scoring runs for sometime now," will bat at number four.

The tourist's bowling was poor in Galle, where they gave Sanath Jayasuriya too much freedom to play his strokes. Wright pointed out that: "Seventy per cent of bowling is about putting the ball in the right areas. We have to carry on from where we left off on the third day, particularly early in the innings, when we will be put under pressure by Jayasuriya.

Sri Lanka, determined to exploit India's weaknesses against fast bowling, have prepared another seamer friendly surface. Jayasuriya described it as "green and hard" and it is expected to offer the bowlers plenty of bounce. Nevertheless, the pitch is not expected to be a minefield and the batsmen should be able to score runs.

Sri Lanka remain keen to play four fast bowlers, but will not finalise the side until this evening. Whatmore, however, announced that he was "very happy with the team that played in Galle" and hinted strongly that Suresh Perera will retain his place despite being reported for a suspect action: "The rules are very clear and Suresh (Perera) can still play international cricket during the next six weeks."

There is though also the option of bringing in an extra batsman, Romesh Kaluwitharana, to bolster the batting. That could well be justified if one takes into account Sri Lanka's poor record with the bat in Kandy where they average only 206 per innings. It is though unlikely. The final option would be for off-spinning allrounder Thilan Samaraweera to make his debut.

India have named a twelve man squad with the final slot going either to right-arm fast bowler Harvinder Singh or to left-arm spinner Rahul Sanghvi after they have a look at the pitch On Wednesday morning.

Likely teams:

Sri Lanka: ST Jayasuriya (Capt), MS Atapattu, K Sangakkara, DPMD Jayawardene, RP Arnold, H Tillakaratne, ASA Perera, WPUJC Vaas, CRD Fernando, M Muralitharan, PDRL Perera

India: SC Ganguly (Capt), R Dravid, SS Das, S Ramesh, M Kaif, HK Bandani, SS Dighe, Harbhajan Singh, BKV Prasad, Z Khan, Harvinder Singh. (12th man - RL Sanghvi)