Black Caps close in on win

When Sri Lanka went to lunch on day three, they appeared to have the stomach for a fight.

Fifteen overs later, they were staring down a hefty defeat in the second and final test of the twomatch series against New Zealand in Wellington.

The visitors lost their last six first-innings wickets for 50 yesterday afternoon, as offspinner Michael Bracewell was their surprise tormentor with the ball. He took 3-50 while seamer Matt Henry excelled with 3-44 from 20 overs.

Having followed on 416 runs behind, captain and opening bat Dimuth Karunaratne again initially stifled New Zealand’s quest for significant inroads as Sri Lanka fought to 113-2 in their second innings at stumps.

That still left them still trailing the hosts by 303 with two days to play.

Only Karunaratne offered worthy resistance in his side’s first innings until he ran out of patience with his miscreant teammates and was caught hitting out at Bracewell after getting to 89 from 188 balls.

Sri Lanka resumed on day three at 26-2 in reply to New Zealand’s imposing 580-4 declared and quickly lost nightwatcher Prabath Jayasuriya and veteran middle-order bat Angelo Mathews.

When Sri Lanka valiantly fought to a draw at the same venue in December 2018, Mathews and Kusal Mendis batted for more than a day to rescue a draw from a perilous position.

Mathews ended unbeaten on 120, facing 323 balls and lasted 447 minutes.

Yesterday, he faced 10 balls and made one before deciding a sunny Sunday in the capital was a good day to go fishing, with the only thing caught being the ball he edged from Henry through to Tom Blundell.

Mendis made an unbeaten 141 from 335 balls as he and Mathews combined for an unbeaten fourth wicket stand of 274 in that game five years ago, and he was doing his best to replicate that effort late on day three, ending it unbeaten on 50 in his second knock – with Mathews with him on 1 not out.

Karunaratne and Dinesh Chandimal put their heads down in the first session and got their side to lunch at 109-4.

The break must have been unpalatable for Chandimal, who careened down the pitch to Bracewell in the first over of the second session and was stumped by Blundell.

Bracewell isn’t the type of spinner who was going to wear down an opposing batter on a good batting track, but Dhananjaya de Silva wasn’t prepared to grind it out either, and the tail did not wag.

Some wet weather forecasted for days four and five may have factored in captain Tim Southee enforcing the follow-on, while his bowling stocks were fresher than England’s when Ben Stokes’ decision to send the hosts back in last month backfired.

Big moment

Karunaratne had just brought up his second half-century in his second dig and in combination with Mendis looked like he may do enough to keep the Black Caps awake a little longer overnight.

But his opposition skipper drew a top-edge to a hook shot that Devon Conway judged well at midwicket in the final hour.

Big picture

New Zealand have two days – amid expected weather interruptions – to take eight more wickets and end their home test season with far better results than what looked likely midway through the second match against England.