Watch: Winning Moments of SriLanka in the 2nd Test against England

Sri Lanka had bowled 115 overs to English batsmen and they had almost achieved the victory. But there are no almosts in Cricket. It’s either a victory or a loss. While Moeen Ali had batted beautifully throughout the day to score his maiden Test century, but on the strike for the last over was James Anderson. He had not scored any runs in the innings so far but had consumed 50 deliveries and played for almost 20 overs to deny the elusive win to Sri Lanka. Sri Lanka had thrown everything at Anderson from spin of Herath to pace trio of Prasad, Eranga and Pradeep. Mathews threw the ball for one last time to Eranga and plan was simple, to bowl short on to the body of Anderson. Ever since Anderson came out to bat he was tested with short ball and he negotiated those balls with comfort. Eranga started from round the wicket angling the short pitched delivery into Anderson.

Anderson negotiated the short one and back of length delivery with ease. This made Eranga to go over the wicket and next two balls even went without any harm done. Sri Lankans looks dejected, looks on the Sangakkarra face was telling the fact how much the win meant for Sri Lankans. It seemed all is lost for Sri Lanka after so much of hard work and probably they realized how England felt in the previous game not being able to win after coming so close. But, destiny had planned something different when Eranga bowled the magic delivery short right near the armpit of Anderson and he lobbed a simple catch to backward square where Hearth was waiting for it. Sri Lanka broke into massive celebrations and Anderson was left dejected down on his knees. This was the Sri Lanka’s first series win in England and they deserved every bit of it with England left with a lot of pondering to do.