Fleming century puts his team on top in first Test
New Zealand
v Sri Lanka
New Zealand captain Stephen Fleming battled oppressive heat to complete a century and put his side on top in the first Test against Sri Lanka yesterday.
Fleming, who scored 78 in the first innings, hit one six and 11 boundaries in his unbeaten 106 to help New Zealand stretch their lead to 280 on the third day.
He and Craig McMillan put on 100 in an unbroken fourth wicket stand to take the touring team to 260 for three at the close.
Team physiotherapist Mark Harrison had to make frequent visits to the middle with anti-dehydration pills, drinks and ice packs to help Fleming during his five-hour innings in temperatures ranging around 34 degrees centigrade.
It was only Fleming's second century in 35 tests. His first was against England at Auckland in 1996-97.
He was given splendid support by McMillan who romped to 64 off just 76 balls, enriching the final session with one 6 and eight 4s.
Their stand followed one of 92 for the third wicket between Fleming and Nathan Astle who made 34 before being caught behind off Sanath Jayasuriya.
Sri Lanka's only success of the afternoon session came when opener Matthew Horne lobbed a catch to Arjuna Ranatunga at short mid-wicket off Mutthiah Muralitharan. He made 35.
Left-arm spinner Niroshan Bandaratilake had made the initial breakthrough, trapping Bryan Young leg before for 11.
Earlier, Sri Lanka, resuming their first innings at 251 for seven, were all out for 285 after left-arm spinner Daniel Vettori had struck twice in his opening over.
Vettori had Pramodya Wickremasinghe leg before for 27, ending a stand of 47 with Niroshan Bandaratilake. Four balls later he bowled Muttiah Muralitharan for nought. The innings ended one run later when Bandaratilake was run out for 20.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article