- England fell 19 runs short chasing 272 in Colombo after sliding from 129 for one to 165 for six.
- Harry Brook faced the cameras again after recent scrutiny and said: “Lovely to get back to the day job.”
- Sri Lanka’s Kusal Mendis made 93 not out, then spin and two late stumpings swung the chase.
Harry Brook welcomed the return to cricket after a messy few months, even as England opened their Sri Lanka series with a 19-run defeat that exposed familiar problems against spin and momentum shifts in chases.
Brook, speaking after the match, said: “Lovely to get back to the day job. Unfortunately we lost the game but there’s still a lot of positives to take from today.” The England captain went into the fixture still under scrutiny after a nightclub incident in New Zealand in October, which only became public at the end of a difficult Ashes tour.
On the field, England looked in control for long stretches. Ben Duckett and Joe Root both made fifties as the tourists chased 272 under lights, moving smoothly to 129 for one. Then the chase unravelled. England slumped to 165 for six as Sri Lanka’s spinners tightened the game and removed set batters, with Jeffrey Vandersay and Dhananjaya de Silva key in the middle overs.
Brook felt the match was still there for England with a cleaner start to the chase. “With the batting power we have, it only took us to get off to a flyer for us to break the back of that chase. On another day, we knock that off three down.”
He pointed to the surface changing as the innings progressed. “The pitch got a little bit more extreme, the turn and lack of bounce, it was proving very difficult to start as a batter out there. Ducky and Rooty made it look fairly easy when they were set and going but they both came off and said it was hard to start on there, just getting used to the turn, bounce and sometimes the lack of spin when it just skids through.
“That’s something we’ve got to look at as a batting unit and hopefully we can take some positives forward into the next couple of games.”
Sri Lanka had earlier built their total around Kusal Mendis, whose unbeaten 93 set the platform for 271 for nine. England will regret letting the hosts finish so strongly, with 80 coming from the final 10 overs, including 23 from Jamie Overton’s last over.
Adil Rashid again led England’s bowling, returning three for 44, but the final surge lifted Sri Lanka to a target that had only rarely been chased successfully at this ground in recent one-day internationals.
England’s reply began with an unwanted reminder for Zak Crawley, back in the one-day side for the first time since December 2023. He threw his hands at a wide ball and edged behind for six. Root and Duckett then restored control, until Sri Lanka’s spin pair removed them and the chase turned frantic.
Two stumpings, first of Brook and then Jacob Bethell, drained England of control at a decisive stage, even if late hitting from Rehan Ahmed, who made 27, and Overton, who added 34, briefly threatened to drag the game back.
England were bowled out with four balls remaining, leaving Brook to balance the immediate disappointment with the bigger picture. This tour feeds into next month’s T20 World Cup build up, yet England also need wins to lift an ODI ranking that has slipped to eighth, putting automatic qualification for the 2027 World Cup under pressure.
Brook said: “That’s been spoken about a hell of a lot in the last year or so, but we just want to try and be in the moment as much as possible. Sri Lanka have just outperformed us there.”
