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Former captain Michael Vaughan has warned England not to “take the mick out of the game” after a sloppy batting performance allowed Sri Lanka back in on day two of the third Test.
England went from 221 for three overnight to 325 all out, with all seven wickets tumbling in a two-hour spell before lunch.
The tourists recovered from a shaky start to make 211 for five in response before the game was curtailed by bad light for the second day in a row.
England have made a virtue of their fearless approach in the past couple of years but Ashes-winning skipper Vaughan believes they indulged themselves too far on this occasion, citing an unusually hyperactive knock of 19 from Harry Brook as the worst example.
“I would ask England, ‘were you on it all day like you would be against India and Australia?’. If they look themselves in the mirror and say they were I would say they are lying,” he told BBC’s Test Match Special.
“There are cricketing gods up there and in a year’s time there are tougher challenges (ahead). Just be careful, Harry Brook. He is an incredible player but don’t take the mick out of the game.
“England delight me a lot in the way they play, I like that they do things completely differently, but I sometimes watch and say be careful because this game has a way of biting you.”
Another former captain, Sir Alastair Cook, echoed those sentiments as he critiqued Brook’s response to Sri Lanka’s defensive lines.
“Sri Lanka bowled in the channel and he didn’t like, so he was moaning to the umpire in jest that it was a bit boring and went to bat on sixth stump. He then hit one straight to cover,” he said.
“Rather than finding a method he was more about trying to talk about it than deal with it. England were complacent today.”
Seamer Olly Stone, who claimed two wickets and a run out to check Sri Lankan momentum, defended his side’s approach insisting there were no regrets in the home dressing room.
“We always talk about taking the positive option and on a different day we miss the fielders and it goes to the boundary,” he said.
“We’re always going to be aggressive rather than shying away from it. On another day the score turns out differently and we go into the bowling innings with a few more runs on the board.”
Sri Lanka’s head coach Sanath Jayasuriya, a wonderfully dynamic batter in his own playing days, thought Brook erred against bowling designed to test his patience.
“He was frustrated. Sometimes you have to slow it down a bit,” he advised.
“You can’t be in top gear all the time when you play this type of cricket. Play your natural game but take as little risk as you can, when there’s a packed field on the off side or leg side you need to fight it hard. It’s part of the game, you need to work hard and be mentally strong.”
The issue of bad light was once again under the microscope, with England unable to use their fast bowlers after tea and one bizarre passage in the afternoon where seamer Chris Woakes was compelled to bowl spin for four deliveries to complete an over before the umpires immediately reversed their recommendation.
“I don’t think they were his best four balls in Test cricket were they? It wasn’t ideal,” Stone said, charitably.
“We’d have loved to bowl seam out there at the end but unfortunately we couldn’t. It’s taken out of our hands. The fact we could get out there at all is great for cricket but unfortunately I couldn’t turn my arm over.”
