Sri Lanka vs India 2017: Five talking points from the Test series

#2 The perils of Sri Lankan cricket

Dinesh Chandimal could do nothing as he watched his team go from bad to worse in the series

Falling down is how we grow, staying down is how we die: Brian Vaszily

Kumar Sangakkara, Mahela Jayawardene, Chaminda Vaas, Tillakaratne Dilshan, Muttiah Muralitharan: big names, bigger shoes to fill.

Sri Lanka cricket already had multiple questions to answer when they came into this series. After the conclusion of the series, these questions have only increased.

Angelo Mathews stepped down as their captain after a shocking ODI series loss against Zimbabwe at home. This declaration was immediately followed by Graham Ford deciding to resign as the head coach of the team.

Confusion hung in the air. There were questions everywhere and on everyone's lips.

India might be the World No. 1 Test side right now, but that doesn't make them unconquerable. Sri Lanka made them seem unconquerable though.

Not once in the entire series did India look like losing, very rarely were they not in an unquestionably winning position. Sri Lanka couldn't tame them with the ball. They couldn't scare them with the bat. They couldn't irk them in the field. It looked like the air, along with the fighting spirit, was sucked out of the hosts completely.

The struggle of Sri Lankan cricket is reflected in their ODI series loss to Zimbabwe last month and their failure to qualify for the 2019 World Cup just yet. It will take a while before they get back to their glory, but the cricketing world would like to see the SLCB as well as its players take meaningful steps in the right direction over the next couple of years.