Rain makes it harder for us - coach Ford | Daily News

Rain makes it harder for us - coach Ford

GALLE: Sri Lanka head coach Graham Ford said that the unexpected rain that came down to wash out an entire session of play makes Sri Lanka’s task of forcing a win in the first Test against Bangladesh that much harder.

“Unfortunately this rain came and we should make up eight overs each day so in total we may lose about 20 overs out of the match which is quite a lot when you are pressing for a result on what seems to be a pretty good batting wicket,” said Ford at the end of the third day at Galle. “It is going to make it harder for us and we haven’t really done our maths as far as where we need to be and how we need to get to the course of tomorrow and how much time we need to bowl them out. We’ll have a chat about that tonight and in the morning. What is important is to show some urgency when we go out to bat, get a partnership going early on so that we can dictate and then declare,” he said.

Sri Lanka hold a 182-run advantage on the first innings after dismissing Bangladesh for 312 before the rains came with six sessions of play left in the match. Sri Lanka could have been in a far happier position had some of the catches that came their way were held. The most crucial of them was the one offered by Mehedi Hasan at nine to Asela Gunaratne at slip off Lakshan Sandakan when Bangladesh were 211-6. That lapse saw Mehedi and Bangladesh captain Mushfiqur Rahim add a valuable 106 runs for the seventh wicket that saw Bangladesh safely past the follow-on mark.

“We want to try and have a clean sheet every time we go out. There were a couple of chances that we missed out on, not that easy though fairly tough but if you want to be the top side in world cricket you need to try and take as many of those as you can,” said Ford. “We can’t really look back too much we go to look forward and look to try and raise our standards as much as possible. Some of the boys are more natural than others as fielders and they are a fairly new side. Finding fielding positions and making the right players in the right positions is also a challenge at this stage,” he said. Ford said that he was happy the way Sri Lanka began the day grabbing four wickets in the first session of play that pushed Bangladesh onto the back foot.

“Our boys stuck to it extremely well and came out quite well this morning with the determination to try and win that first session which they did well,” said Ford. “Gladly they stuck to the task and ended up finishing it quite well.” Ford said that in Sri Lanka especially with a guy like Angelo (Mathews) injured it was hard to balance the side out. “The selectors felt on this sort of pitch to have the extra bowler and it was important that one of the batsmen batted big in the circumstances and fortunately that happened.” - ST


Add new comment