Muttiah Muralitharan was hoisted by his teammates on their shoulders amid raucous cheer from a captivated crowd when he signed off in Test cricket with 800 scalps and a resounding 10-wicket victory in opposition to a star-studded India in Galle in July 2010. When Kumar Sangakkara hung up his boots in August 2015, additionally in opposition to India in Colombo, he was Sri Lanka’s highest-ever run-scorer and extensively feted as one of many best batters from the subcontinent. Just a few months previous to Sangakkara’s exit, his shut buddy Mahela Jayawardene bid adieu with a half-century in his closing innings in an emphatic 105-run win over Pakistan at Colombo.
In phrases of longevity and straining each sinew for Sri Lanka, Angelo Mathews, fourth on the checklist of the nation’s most capped Test gamers with 119 appearances over a 16-year span, is true up there with the illustrious names simply talked about. But it is symptomatic of Sri Lanka’s corrosive decline over the previous decade that Mathews’ Test profession got here to a shut final Saturday after a drab draw in opposition to Bangladesh in Galle even as the eye of the cricketing world was firmly fastened on a mouthwatering battle between heavyweights England and India at Headingley.
When the 38-year-old walked out to bat for the ultimate time in his Test profession, Sri Lanka was 34 for two on day 5 and trying to salvage a stalemate in a contest the place each groups piled on large first-innings totals. He chewed up 45 deliveries and scored eight runs earlier than an inside-edge onto his pad off left-arm spinner Taijul Islam popped to Mominul Haque at foolish level. In the primary essay, after getting a guard of honour from the Bangladesh gamers, he fell to Mominul’s sluggish left-arm orthodox on 39.
Angelo Mathews.
| Photo Credit:
AP
Having been dropped from the T20I crew a 12 months in the past and the ODI crew after the 2023 World Cup in India — the place he grew to become the primary batter in worldwide cricket, by the way in opposition to Bangladesh, to be dismissed timed out — Mathews’ determination to announce his Test retirement forward of the Bangladesh collection was a matter of practicality reasonably than essentially dropping the drive to coach and compete. With Sri Lanka’s subsequent Test project in opposition to the West Indies within the Caribbean being a 12 months away — a grim actuality in regards to the ICC Future Tours Programme (FTP) that highlights the chasm between the ‘Big Three’ and the opposite Test-playing nations — he noticed little level in carrying on past the Galle Test. He stays out there for choice within the white-ball codecs.
“I played my 100th Test in Galle, so I thought I’d say goodbye in Galle. But the main reason was because we don’t have any games coming up, at least for now. After this, we’ll be having our next assignment in Test cricket after a year’s time, that is a very long wait,” Mathews informed the media forward of his Test farewell versus Bangladesh.
“I thought it’s good to give an opportunity to whoever is going to replace me in the second Test, because he’s not going to get an opportunity till the next year. And in that year, you don’t know what’s going to happen. So I thought I’d just play one game and then try and give an opportunity to the other guy who’s replacing me in the second Test.”
It might not be the best method to stroll into the sundown, however that shouldn’t take something away from Mathews’ stellar Test profession. To end with 8214 runs at a mean of 44.4 with 16 centuries, together with a better of 200, means he’ll go down as one among Sri Lanka’s most prolific run-makers behind Sangakkara and Jayawardene. He was additionally a shrewd medium-pacer earlier than a physique battered by accidents compelled him to chop down on his bowling.
All-round talent
Right from the second that he burst onto the worldwide scene in 2009, it felt like Sri Lanka had discovered a pot of gold. In a nation historically starved of real pace-bowling all-rounders, very like neighbouring India, Mathews was a ray of sunshine with all the correct components to develop into among the finest of his breed within the enterprise.
Certainly within the first half of his profession, as a part of a highly-skilled and eclectic Sri Lankan outfit formed by the sharp minds of Sangakkara and Jayawardene, Mathews’ performances have been on par with the excessive expectations.
Sample his numbers until the top of 2015: after 56 Tests, he had tallied 4015 runs at 50.18. With the ball as effectively, 30 of the 33 scalps that he has ended with got here on this interval.
He was at his peak as a Test batter throughout 2013 and 2014, averaging greater than 70 in each years and producing stupendous knocks that embodied his recreation consciousness and elegant vary. A working example is a Test in opposition to Pakistan at Abu Dhabi that started on December 31, 2013. Across two innings, Mathews, who had develop into captain earlier that 12 months, showcased starkly contrasting and but equally efficient approaches. In the primary, he strode in at 76 for 4 with Jayawardene already again within the pavilion. Soon, Sri Lanka can be 82 for 5 with Sangakkara, too, making the lengthy stroll again. Mathews’ riposte was a good, counterattacking 91 off simply 127 balls in a modest whole of 204. Second time round, with Pakistan amassing a lead of 179 runs, the Lankans have been successfully seven for 4 and on the cusp of defeat when Mathews marked his guard at first of day 4. What adopted was a present of supreme defiance as Mathews dug in for seven hours and 34 minutes, scoring 157 off 343 deliveries with out getting dislodged to assist his aspect eke out a hard-fought draw.
Best knock
As marvellous as these two innings within the desert have been, it is difficult to look past his 160 in opposition to England at Headingley in the summertime of 2014 as his best knock. After scraping a nerve-wracking draw in opposition to Alastair Cook’s males within the opener at Lord’s, the place Mathews hit a first-innings ton, the guests appeared to haven’t any escape route after they have been lowered to 277 for seven, an total lead of simply 169 runs, within the second dig in Leeds. But Mathews, as soon as once more, stood as much as be the saviour.
With Rangana Herath keen to place a value on his wicket on the different finish, Mathews, all nous and nerves of metal, delivered a masterclass in batting with the tail. He cobbled collectively a 149-run stand for the eighth wicket with the left-arm spinner in opposition to an English assault led by James Anderson as Sri Lanka stretched its whole to 457 and secured a memorable 1-0 collection win. That he had figures of 16-4-44-4 within the first innings was a testomony to his all-round prowess.
In the shorter codecs, too, Mathews was irrepressible. Just how important he was to the set-up will be understood from Sangakkara’s assertion that the all-rounder’s absence for the 2011 ODI World Cup closing in opposition to India as a consequence of harm was a main consider Sri Lanka’s defeat.
“If you take our entire campaign, whatever we did, Mathews’ overs and his ability to bat with the tail and read situations was an incredible bonus to us. He was a young chap who came into the side and from day one he could read situations. It’s just instinct, how to up the rate, how to control the bowler, when to accelerate. The composition of the side and the fact that we were forced to make the change was to me the turning point,” Sangakkara mentioned in a chat with ace off-spinner R. Ashwin in 2020.
Besides the 2011 50-over World Cup, Mathews was additionally a core member of the crew that completed runner-up within the 2009 and 2012 T20 World Cups. The curse of dropping a spree of finals got here to an finish within the 2014 version when the islanders received previous India by six wickets to present Sangakkara and Jayawardene a good swansong from the shortest format. Mathews, as ever, performed his half with figures of 1 for 25 in 4 overs.
In these years, Mathews was in a position to feed off the imposing presence of Sangakkara and Jayawardene and do his factor. But as soon as the 2 grizzled veterans walked away in fast succession, Mathews needed to bear a bulk of the burden as the skipper and senior statesman. Curiously, he performed extra matches than anybody else in worldwide cricket from 2010 to 2015, which maybe resulted within the spate of accidents and health points within the latter half of his profession.
Mathews hit all-time low in 2018 when he was sacked as limited-overs captain, faraway from the crew altogether and mocked for his health and operating between the wickets by then coach Chandika Hathurusingha. Some others might have discovered the problem of bouncing again and silencing detractors at that stage too demanding, however not the person from Colombo.
“It was in 2018 that I sat down with Dilshan Fonseka (men’s team trainer) and looked at the amount of injuries that I had. He told me that my body couldn’t bear it. So I changed everything — the way I eat, my lifestyle, and my training,” Mathews recollected in a latest interview to ESPNCricinfo.
And to underline that he isn’t the type of character to take issues mendacity down, he celebrated a rearguard Test hundred in opposition to New Zealand in Wellington in December that 12 months by doing push-ups and flexing his proper bicep within the path of Hathurusingha within the Sri Lankan dressing room.
Looking again, Mathews says he doesn’t have a lot to remorse in his profession besides the truth that he didn’t be part of the ten,000-run membership in Tests. “I couldn’t achieve the 10,000-run mark. But every other thing, I’ve given my best in every situation,” Mathews mirrored in that interview. “I’ve tried to win games for my country in every situation. Giving 100% to your team in every single game is another thing, so I was wanting to play all three formats and contribute with bat, ball, and in the field, in every single game. I was absolutely going for it.”
Anybody who watched him over these years will attest to that final bit. Just as Sri Lanka has discovered it unimaginable to fill the proverbial large sneakers of Muralitharan, Sangakkara and Jayawardene then, Mathews might be a particularly onerous act to observe.
