Sri Lanka batter Bangladesh by 192 runs to sweep series

Sri Lanka winners of the two-Test series 2-0 against Bangladesh

Sri Lanka Test Captain Dhananjaya de Silva receives the Dutch Bangla Bank trophy for winning the series

Kamindu Mendis receives the Player of the Series trophy, he was also Player of the Match

Sri Lanka struck early on the fifth day with Kamindu Mendis (extreme left) dismissing Taijul Islam for 14

• Move to fourth position in ICC World Test Championship table
• Kamindu Mendis Player of the Series and Player of the Match

Mehidy Hasan Miraz was the only Bangladesh batsman to defy the Lankan bowlers scoring an unbeaten 81

Sri Lanka completed the final rites of the Bangladesh second innings on the morning of the fifth and final day when they captured the last three wickets for 50 runs to bowl the hosts out for 318 and win the second cricket Test by 192 runs at Chattogram Wednesday.

Having won the first Test at Sylhet by 328 runs, Sri Lanka completed a 2-0 sweep of the two-Test series. The series victory propelled Sri Lanka to fourth place in the ICC World Test Championship standings behind India, Australia and New Zealand.

Bangladesh put up their best show with the bat in the series, but fell well short of the target of 511 with only Mehidy Hasan Miraz’s batting efforts with the tail delaying the inevitable for more than an hour on the final day.

Once again it was part-time spinner Kamindu Mendis who provided Sri Lanka with their first breakthrough of the morning by having Taijul Islam caught superbly at second slip by Nishan Madushka for 14 to pick up his third wicket of the innings.

The second new ball taken as soon as it became available brought a swift end to the Bangladesh innings. Lahiru Kumara with his extra pace accounted for Hasan Mahmud and Khaled Ahmed, leaving Mehidy undefeated on a defiant 81 off 110 balls (14 fours). Kumara ended up with four wickets and his performance coupled with those of Vishwa Fernando, Kasun Rajitha and Asitha Fernando showed how dominant the Sri Lankan quicks were. They accounted for 33 of the 40 Bangladesh wickets to fall in the series and consistently threatened to make breakthroughs with swing and seam and excellent bouncers and yorkers even on slow pitches. In a nutshell, Sri Lanka outplayed Bangladesh in all three departments of the game.

Sri Lanka Captain Dhananjaya de Silva who led the team admirably gave credit to his bowlers whom he said stuck to their basics and the batters for doing their job well. “The batters were a bit disappointed that they did not get runs in the first Test, but they are experienced and it’s good that we have players like that. I was confident they would get the runs. There wasn’t a lot of spin on offer, so I thought about reverse swing to get wickets. The pacers were really on the spot.”

Kamindu Mendis who won the Player of the Match for his contribution of 92* and 3/32 and the Player of the Series award for scoring 367 runs and taking three wickets, said, “In the last few months I have been working really hard on my bowling with the spin bowling coach. In this innings I was very confident about my right arm, so I kept going with that. In the Sylhet match it was quite hard to bat. Credit goes to the captain who also got two centuries.”

Bangladesh’s losing Captain Najmul Hossain Shanto said, “We did not play well, the bowlers showed a lot of character on a wicket like this but the batters did not bat well. Everyone got set but did not make a big score, we have to think about that, and make sure that the ones who get set go big. As a player we have to prepare ourselves for any situation. If we play more first-class cricket it will help us. The way Hasan Mahmud came and bowled in his first game, he bowled really well, Shakib bhai the way he batted and bowled, and Miraz the way he batted in the second were a few positives.”