A century of Test matches is my dream

Just a week after a gruelling tour of Australia, we are back at home and the prospect of an exciting three test series against England awaits in a week. Any tour to Australia is a learning curve and I believe we benefited immensely from the experience.

In the final day of the second test, we did put up a good fight, despite scoring only 246 in the first innings. Our first innings total was largely due to Mahela’s century which was an impressive innings, considering that he not only had to play his natural game but also had to contend with the possibility of running out of partners.

We even had an outside chance to win the game when Ponting opted not to enforce the follow-on and decided to bat for a second time, most probably to rest his bowlers who were tiring.

Achieving a target of 507 against the best team in the world in the fourth innings of a game would have been a historic feat but we can take confidence from the fact that we came within 96 runs of doing that. At some point, I am sure the Australians were a bit worried!

That we were able to test the Aussies was largely due to Sanga’s innings. That is undoubtedly the best I have seen him batting. He was excellent in his timing and stroke-play and had absolute control and concentration. On the fourth and fifth days of the game, he was a joy to watch.

We were all awaiting his double hundred in the dressing room when he was ruled out in bizarre fashion. It was a cruel end to a brilliant innings but Sanga took it in his stride. Of course, Sanga’s dismissal also effectively ended our chances of winning the game.

If we were to make a match of it, we needed many batsmen, not just one, to play a big innings. Marvan at the top of the order stroked his way to 80 and Sanath and Lasith scored forties but the other batsmen failed to fire.

Looking back, we must not let Sanga’s superb performance overshadow the fact that five batsmen together scored eight runs and that there were only two major partnerships in the top order between Marvan and Kumar and then between Kumar and Sanath. It is a factor that we need to address before the England series.

Overall however, our performance in the second test gives us confidence to face England. They are not the best side in the world and we are playing at home. We did miss Sanga in the first test and we will be playing at near full strength against the Englishmen except for the absence of Farveez Maharoof who has suffered a stress fracture of his ankle.

At the end of the second test though, there was a poignant moment when, on the final day, Manager Sriyan Samararatne informed us that Marvan would be retiring. Marvan has had many issues to deal with in the recent past, but none of it has been with the team. His final innings against a fired up Australian attack showed that he still has what it takes to compete at the highest level.

Now, my focus will be on the Kandy test against England. If I do play, it will be my 100th test match and to play for a hundred test matches has been my dream as a cricketer. Over the weekend, I will be playing for my club in the domestic competition and then all the boys in the squad will be training for the tests.

I have happy memories of Kandy as that is where I made my test debut thirteen years ago against Pakistan. But Kandy is also Murali’s home town and we are all aware that the entire country is waiting for him to break Shane Warne’s bowling record for the highest number of test wickets.

Murali needs only five wickets more and we really hope he will do it in the Kandy test for he has been such a wonderful bloke and an exemplary ambassador for his country.

For my part, I am ready to focus on my game and re-establish my place in the line up. With advancing age, every cricketer goes through this phase and I am relishing the challenge ahead of me. At this stage of my career I am well aware that every single game counts.

I am also aware that in the interests of Sri Lankan cricket, it is time to look to the future. Youngsters have to be groomed while experienced seniors are around. That is another lesson we can learn from Australia. While there are many new faces in theirline up, they can play around seniors such as Ponting, Hayden and Glichrist.

Against England, our opponents next week, we will need to have a game plan, stick to it and get our basics right. We know that they have quite a few world class players in their ranks but we would not be targeting any particular player. It is also important that both batsmen and bowlers share the workload equally.

We haven’t being playing test cricket at home since we hosted the Bangladeshis six months ago, so this would be a great opportunity for cricket lovers in the country to witness some exciting games between two evenly matched teams.

I hope the outcome would be positive, both for me as a player and more importantly for the boys because this would be the beginning of a demanding season that would take in matches against England, Australia, India and the West Indies over the next six months.