Daryl Mitchell Notches 5 Test Ton Of His Career

A Daryl Mitchell special century and key contribution from Matt Henry has again put New Zealand ahead of Sri Lanka in the first test match being played at Hagley Oval, Christchurch.

Starting the third day at 162/5, New Zealand was in need of a stable partnership to reach anywhere near the total Sri Lanka posted in the first innings. In the end, they succeeded to have 18 runs lead over Sri Lanka due to tremendous innings played by Daryl Mitchell.

Michael Bracewell could only add 25 runs as Prabath Jayasuriya cut short his innings, leaving New Zealand in a state of uncertainty with 6 wickets down on 188. From there on, a good hand by Tim Southee (25 runs) helped team to go past 230 runs, his partnership with Mitchell added 47 runs in the next 8 overs.

Holding one end strong, Daryl Mitchell kept adding crucial runs and scored 5th century of his test career and his first against Sri Lanka. He reached the milestone in 192 deliveries, his 100 is what allowed New Zealand to put some pressure on Sri Lanka.

A couple of players from both teams scored 60 odd runs but New Zealand has advantage of having this extra 20 runs and if they can restrict Sri Lanka anything under 280, they will happily prefer to chase it down in the fourth innings.

It wasn’t only Mitchell who picked attention in today’s game, Matt Henry, playing on his home ground, scored third half century of his test career with momentum providing 72 runs off 75 balls. New Zealand’s lower order has been adding crucial runs to their total very effectively, it was Tim Southee special against England when they wanted to fight back and they went on to win that game.

Now, Matt Henry has done a similar kind of job in a similar kind of situation, how productive that will come to be, yet remains to know.

Sri Lankan Bowling Unit Is Stepping Up

The 25 years old Asitha Fernando looked good with his attack, picking up first four wickets haul of his career. He removed Tom Latham with a wonderful yorker which would have been a delight to watch for Sri Lankan fans. Lahiru Kumara once again impressed with his express pace and locked up wickets of Kane Williamson, Henry Nicholls and Daryl Mitchell.

It could have been better performance from Sri Lankan bowlers, they will be disappointed because they were in a position to restrict New Zealand under 300. Credit to Daryl Mitchell the way he went about on day 3, but Sri Lankan bowlers erred in their line lengths, maybe they went too hard for wickets and end up conceding more runs that was on the table for New Zealand.