England puts Sri Lanka under pressure early on

England stormed the Sri Lankan line-up on the opening morning of the Test series at Old Trafford, leaving the visitors stumbling at 80/5. Chris Woakes was the best bowler with two wickets, while Gus Atkinson, Mark Wood and Shoaib Bashir also picked up their first wickets. Dhananjaya de Silva started his innings positively and is batting for victory with an unbeaten 28 runs, but the captain will need a lot more support after lunch if Sri Lanka are to recover.

England needed just five overs to strike first after Sri Lanka elected to bat as Atkinson Dimuth Karunaratne's pace and bounce surprised the former captain. He attempted a pull shot but only managed a top edge which was caught by the wicket-keeper.

In the very next over, Woakes ripped open the visitors' top order with a double-wicket over. The pacer lured Nishan Madushka with a length ball that swung away from the batsman and eventually reached the outside edge. Five balls later, Sri Lanka suffered a heavy blow when Woakes took the big wicket of veteran Angelo Matthews. The batsman gave no chance to an indipper, was hit on the pads and was awarded leg-before-wicket.

Sri Lanka were reduced to 6-3 and desperately needed a partnership to get out of the hole. After England changed bowlers, Kusal Mendis got the first boundary of the match in the 11th over and added another on the next delivery. Mendis repeated the feat in Potts' next over, after which Wood was brought on.

The move worked brilliantly as Wood struck a snorter in his second over as Mendis tried to fend it off, but the ball hit the thumb on its way to the slip cordon. Bashir was next in line and also struck in his second over. Dinesh Chandimal, who offered a little resistance, could not last until the lunch break as Bashir trapped him right in front of him.

Short results: Sri Lanka 80/5 (Dhananjaya de Silva 28*; Chris Woakes 2/17) vs England