Australia's push for victory halted by rain after only 27 overs were possible on Friday
Match Report:
ScorecardAussies leave Sri Lanka five down after rain-hit third day
Having swept aside the best resistance Sri Lanka could muster across the first two and a bit days of the opening Test, Australia met a much more intractable force – Galle's sodden sub-tropical weather – that has placed the one-sided contest in the balance.
Multiple bursts of torrential rain in what is historically the driest month in the southern part of the island saw play curtailed shortly before lunch, then officially abandoned at 3.30pm with Sri Lanka 5-136 in reply to Australia's daunting first innings of 6(dec)-654.
Play will resume 15 minutes earlier than scheduled tomorrow, weather permitting.
But despite holding a 518-run lead with the top half of the home team's batting line-up already dismissed, Australia must now fight the clock with the possibility of further showers tomorrow though the forecast for day five looks brighter.
While the prospect of enforcing the follow-on seemed unlikely a day ago given the short turnaround before the second Test that starts on February 6, it now seems a far more viable option for Australia as they hunt a further 15 wickets.
The sudden reduction in available game time also reduces the prospect of Sri Lanka being able to establish an overall lead in their second innings that could potentially prove tricky to prove batting last, which loomed as the scenario under which Australia could potentially lose a game they have dominated from ball one.
Certainly the visitors have proved far more potent with the ball than the hosts appeared across their largely toothless 153 overs in the field on days one and two.
The sharp contrast between Australia's bowling acumen and that of the home team was again underscored at the outset of the morning session, when Mitchell Starc began his day's work with a maiden.
It meant Australia's attack had managed as many scoreless overs (four) in barely an hour of bowling as Sri Lanka's underwhelming quartet managed across the first two sessions of the match.
And not only were they keeping their opponent's scoring below the four-plus an over Sri Lanka conceded, the Australians managed to consistently create chances even if not all of them brought wickets.
In the day's third over, Dinesh Chandimal swept Nathan Lyon just over the head of a fielder at backward square leg and pocketed a boundary but might have been dismissed for 15 from the following delivery.
Sri Lanka's former skipper – one of three former skippers playing in this Test under current leader Dhananjaya de Silva – didn't pick Lyon's arm-ball which took the outside edge but flew between keeper Alex Carey and Steve Smith at slip for another four.
However, the home team's lucky ride came to a shuddering halt in Starc's third over of the steamy, sun-drenched morning with what at face value seemed flukey happenstance but was perhaps a well-hatched plan.
Having dropped an extra fielder to the boundary behind square leg which signalled the likelihood of some short-pitched stuff, Starc slid a full, fast ball behind the pads of Kamindu Mendis who obligingly tickled it to Carey.
Mitch Starc with Australia's first wicket of the day in Galle!
— 7Cricket (@7Cricket) January 31, 2025
Kamindu gets a little tickle down the leg side and Carey takes the simple catch #SLvAUS pic.twitter.com/7Ry39SxYdG
There was an audible groan from Sri Lanka fans as their best-performed batter of the recent past – with centuries in both previous Tests at Galle against New Zealand last September – trudged off with 15 to his name and his 4-67.
Chandimal, however, remained undaunted by the lopsided scorecard and even though Sri Lanka remained almost 600 runs adrift he kept up the attack, driving then reverse-sweeping Lyon to the boundary.
Dhananjaya joined the counter-attack with consecutive fours through cover from Todd Murphy who had replaced Lyon at the pavilion end, but it was the Sri Lanka skipper's preparedness to attack that brought him undone next over.
Having reached 22 from 33 deliveries, Dhananjaya leaped from his crease with the aim of lifting Matthew Kuhnemann over the leg side but telegraphed his move to the bowler who countered by dragging the ball shorter and wider outside off stump.
It gripped and turned as Dhananjaya tried furiously to re-adjust his stroke, only to see it fizz past his outside edge into the gloves of Carey who took it smartly near shoulder height before completing the straightforward stumping.
Another wicket for Kuhnemann as Dhananjaya runs right past it for the easy Carey stumping!#SLvAUS pic.twitter.com/MdFOKwcdic
— 7Cricket (@7Cricket) January 31, 2025
At 5-107 and still almost 550 runs in arrears on the first innings, Sri Lanka's best hope of saving the opening match of the two-Test series rested partly with Chandimal and largely with Galle's unseasonably wet late January weather.
The former played his part by posting his 31st Test half century and had pushed his score to 63 when the latter element of that salvage operation arrived seemingly without warning.
The usually vigilant army of Galle ground staff was caught unawares when light rain suddenly began to fall 15 minutes before the scheduled lunch break, and quickly became heavier.
Australia's bowlers and fielders signalled their willingness to play through the shower thinking it was but a passing flurry, and initially umpires Chris Gaffaney and Adrian Holdstock were happy to accommodate despite Chandimal and batting partner's Kusal Mendis's keenness to vacate the field.
That decision soon became self-evident as the light shower quickly evolved into a monsoonal rain dump, which saw lunch taken early.
Further rain during the adjournment, followed by another heavy downpour an hour later placed the remainder of the day's play quite literally under a cloud.
However, when the rain stopped and the sun that had been a welcome of rare sight during the morning made a reappearance the hour-long ritual to remove the all-of-ground network of covers was begun and a restart time of 2.50pm fixed.
Just as the last of the tarpaulins was being hauled from the playing surface, the ground staff suddenly stopped what they were doing, looked en masse to the foreboding bank of blackness bearing down from the north-east and began re-fitting the covers.
The Australia bowlers who were in the midst of their warm-up routines with the expectation of getting back on within 30 minutes were clearly bemused as they made way, and returned to the dressing room.
But the local weather wisdom was proved unerringly correct as another apocalyptic rain event arrived and more than four hours' play, and potentially 63 overs, were washed away.
With Sri Lanka's hopes of sneaking a draw after two and bit days of total subjugation rising as quickly and surely as water levels in Galle's gutters.
Qantas Tour of Sri Lanka
First Test: January 29-February 2, Galle (3.30pm AEDT)
Second Test: February 6-10, Galle (3.30pm AEDT)
Sri Lanka Test squad: Dhananjaya de Silva (c), Dimuth Karunaratne, Pathum Nissanka (subject to fitness), Oshada Fernando, Lahiru Udara, Dinesh Chandimal, Angelo Mathews, Kamindu Mendis, Kusal Mendis, Sadeera Samarawickrama, Sonal Dinusha, Prabath Jayasuriya, Jeffrey Vandersay, Nishan Peiris, Asitha Fernando, Vishwa Fernando, Lahiru Kumara, Milan Rathnayake
Australia Test squad: Steve Smith (c), Sean Abbott, Scott Boland, Alex Carey, Cooper Connolly, Travis Head (vc), Josh Inglis, Usman Khawaja, Sam Konstas, Matt Kuhnemann, Marnus Labuschagne, Nathan Lyon, Nathan McSweeney, Todd Murphy, Mitchell Starc, Beau Webster
First ODI: February 12, Colombo (3.30pm AEDT)
Second ODI: February 14, Colombo (3.30pm AEDT)