By Dhammika Ratnaweera
England cricket team will arrive in Sri Lanka first week of next March to play two matches against Sri Lanka under the ICC World Test Championship. Englishmen are scheduled to arrive on 3rd March and they will play two practice games before the first test which will commence from 19th March at Galle International cricket Stadium .
England team last toured Sri Lanka and registered a 3-0 whitewash against the hosts and currently sit fifth in the ICC World Test Championship table, on 56 points, after drawing the Ashes series 2-2 this summer. However Sri Lanka recorded their last test win against England at Leeds in 2014 and this time both teams are expected to make keen tussle . Especially in this test world championship winning team receive 60 points for the one game and both sides are expected to win the match to come forward at the world test championships
England will play their first three day practice game against Sri Lanka Cricket Board Presidents X1 from 7 to 9 March at Marians cricket grounds Katunayake a while Englishman once again meet SLC Board Presidents X1 at the four day practice game which will commence from 12 to 15th March at P. Sara Oval grounds .
The second test between the two teams will commence from 27th March at the R.Premadasa International Cricket Stadium. Sri Lanka played their last test match against Zimbabwe in July 2017 won that match by 4 wickets . This time after one and half years time Sri Lanka will play test match at Premadasa Stadium. In fact this is the first time England will play test match at this venue .
So far Sri Lanka played nine test matches at R . Premadasa Stadium and won four , drawn four and lost only to New Zealand in May 1998 .
Before the England test series Sri Lanka scheduled to play two test matches in December against Pakistan for the world test championship.
The tour will begin on 7 March, the eve of the ICC Women’s T20 World Cup 2020 final, with a three-day warm-up match against a Sri Lanka Board President’s XI in Katunayake. That will be followed by a second warm-up game, this one a four-day first-class fixture, against the same opposition, between 12 and 15 March, at Colombo’s P Sara Oval.
The series is yet another assignment in an already packed red-ball schedule for England, who are scheduled to play 14 Tests between now and next year’s ICC Men’s T20 World Cup in Australia in October-November.
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