By Sanduni Kulatunga
Sri Lanka finished the opening day with 267/3 on the board with Karunaratne going strong on 132* and Dhananjaya de Silva building on 56* before umpires called stumps after 88 overs of play.
The 1st test match of the series took place at the Galle International Stadium today. Sri Lanka won the toss and chose to bat first and was off to a very a good start. Captain Dimuth Karunaratne and the young talent of the team Pathum Nissanka opened up the batting. Pathum was promoted up the order in the absence of Thirimanne. Both the openers scored half centuries and Pathum Nissanka scored his 2nd test half century.
Their partnership was remarkable in which they collectively scored  beautiful 139 (Nissanka 56,Dimuth 73*) in less than 50 overs. Pathum Nissanka fell off Shannon Gabriel’s delivery as he was caught by Cornwall.
Oshada Fernando was next in game to score against the West Indies. Unfortunately he was out for 3 runs by Roston Chase. Angelo Mathews to faced the same fate as of Oshada-Out for 3 runs-and once again it was the clever Roston Chase.
Next in line was Dhananjaya De Silva who established the partnership with the skipper, where he scored his 9th Test half century. The skipper was on a run Dimuth Karunaratne as he scored his 13th century. He along with the other half centurians kept the game going after being away from the Test field for more than 5 months.
At the end of the day the scoreboard displayed a beautiful 267 for 3 wickets, for the surprise of the Indies. Their main concern is their debutant Jeremy Solozano who was ruled out of the game due to an injury and was immediately rushed to the hospital. It is reported that he will not play but is stabilized.
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