A matter of days after the last World Test Championship campaign concluded, the next one begins on Tuesday when Sri Lanka and Bangladesh open up the 2025-27 competition when they meet in the first of two Tests in Galle.
Both sides will want to get off to a decent start with the World Test Championship really begin to grow in relevance and prestige in the world game and with two Asian sides battling it out here we should be in for a decent game.
Where to watch
The match will be shown in full for the whole five days on TNT Sports 1 in the UK with the action getting underway at 5.30am on Tuesday morning.
Sri Lanka
It will be interesting to see how Sri Lanka go in this cycle of the World Test Championship. It was only very deep into the last one that they were eventually denied a spot in the final of the competition so that should fuel the flames for them to go well again this time around. I think one thing that we are going to see in this cycle is that home advantage becomes a big thing and with them having it here, Sri Lanka will be keen to get off to a winning start.
The expectation is that the wicket is going to be very good for batting here in the early stages so there is an emphasis on Sri Lanka to go well with the bat. To be fair to them, they have batted fairly well in recent times and with an attack which is useful in all conditions, if they can continue to put sufficient runs on the board then there is no reason for them not to feel confident that they can come out of top here and go one up with two to play.
Bangladesh
This hasn’t been the strongest format for Bangladesh throughout the years and you do wonder how strong they are going to be in this cycle but with Zimbabwe and Ireland beginning to get more Test cricket, at some point Bangladesh are going to have to come good in it else they face being an irrelevance in it and that would be hard for such a huge nation to accept. Bangladesh have named a strong looking side for this series so they have no excuses not to fire here.
Bangladesh haven’t had any warm up cricket in this part of the world though so they might warm into their series, although conditions aren’t a great deal different to back home so they should be able to acclimatise quicker than in some places. Bangladesh are going to have to bat well in this series. If they do that then they will be confident that they have the bowlers to keep them competitive and attempt to get the job done.
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Team News
Angelo Mathews begins his farewell series in the heart of the Sri Lanka middle order for this match. They begin life without Dimuth Karunaratne in this series with Lahiru Kumara out injured. Mahiru Udara is set to open the batting with Dhananjaya de Silva captaining the side.
Bangladesh have a fitness doubt over Mehidy Hasan Miraz who has had a fever in the lead up to the game. It would be a blow if he isn’t available. Jaker Ali is likely to take the gloves with Mushfiqur Rahim playing as a batter.
Betting
Prabath Jayasuriya has an exceptional record on this ground, one which there is no reason he won’t enhance over the five days of this match. He has a staggering 63 wickets on this ground in just 10 Test matches and when you consider that his highest score with the bat in this format of the game came against Bangladesh, it would be a little daft not to expect a big showing from the Sri Lankan spin bowler in this game.
He has a performance line of 139.5 for this match and in 10 matches on this ground the only times he hasn’t covered this with the ball alone was when Sri Lanka played Australia earlier in the year, but they are one of the better Test teams, unlike Bangladesh who aren’t that good. He could very well cover this line with the ball, especially in the second innings with the wicket expected to crumble, but with runs available and catches I like the over here.
Tips
Back P.Jayasuriya’s Performance – Over 139.5pts for a 3/10 stake at 1.80 with Bet365
