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Warne revels in fairytale comeback
By Shamseer Jaleel
Leg spinners Shane Warne put Australia off to a winning start in the test series when they convincingly beat the home team by 197 runs with more than one session to play.

Following a 12 month ban for taking drugs Warne roared back to superb form with a match bag of (10-159) in his come back match. He was well supported by McGill who took 4 of the second innings Sri Lankan wickets.

Warne who was playing in his 108th test match became only the second bowler to take 500 wickets after Courtney Walsh (519) of the West Indies. His 500th victim was the Sri Lankan skipper Hashan Tilakaratne when he skied one to be caught by Andrew Symonds. New South Wales player McGill also had a landmark when he took Samaraweera's wicket. This was his 150th test wicket.

Sri Lanka resuming at 3/0 lost Sangakkara early in the day when he was trapped leg before by Kasprowicsz. Then Atapattu and Jayawardena put on 27 runs. Soon Atapattu went for an unwanted shot outside the off stump to give a simple catch to Hayden off Warne. From this point onwards Sri Lanka lost wickets regularly to end up at 89/6.

They batted very negatively and only Upul Chandana who played a little cameo innings with a brisk 43 off 34 balls with 7 hits to the ropes. He put on 30 runs with Tilakaratne and 34 runs with Samaraweera for the 7th and 8th wickets respectively.

Sri Lanka were finally bowled out for 154 runs which gave the Kangaroos an easy 197 runs to go 1 up in the three test series. The second match in the series will be played in Kandy from March 16-20.

Shane Warne speaking to The Sunday Times soon after the match told that the wicket played really well. When we scored 220 in the initial innings I thought the match will be over within 4 days. The wicket was superb it was a friendly one for spinners. I have very good memories of this country from the time I made my debut tour here 12 years ago in Colombo under Allan Border. I took some 4 wickets in the second to win by 16 odd runs. This test here in Galle will be another memorable one for me for 2 reasons. One is my 500th test wicket and my come back match.

Man of the match Mathew Hayden told The Sunday Times that the wicket played really good although it took lot of turn on the initial day. Batting was so difficult on that day. Hayden also set up a world record of 7 catches by a non wicket keeper.

With the second match coming in Kandy Samaraweera is likely to miss due to his injury. This is the second time the home team has lost in Galle. Earlier in the year 2000 Pakistan pace duo of Waqar and Wasim won the match for them.

Meanwhile Australia has announced that 21 year old Sahun Tait from South Australia will replace Bret Lee. Lee will fly back to Australia tomorrow. Tait was also the young cricketer of the year in the year 2003.

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