Sri Lanka earn a big consolation win in the 5th ODI against England

Sri Lanka earned a big 219 runs via the DLS method in the fifth and final One day international against England played at R Premadasa Stadium, Colombo on Tuesday. It was a dominating performance by the Sri Lankan team who batted first and scored a massive total and then defended the target with ease before rain arrived.

Sri Lankan captain Dinesh Chandimal won the toss and elected to bat first. For the first time in the series, Niroshan Dickwella and Sadeera Samarwickamara played with positive intent putting pressure on England bowlers. At the end of the first 10 overs, both openers raced to 73 runs. Dickwella reached his half-century off 49 balls while the other opener Sadeera completed his half-century off 40 balls.

Moeen Ali got the wicket of Sadeera for 54 ending a brilliant 137 run partnership in just 19.1 overs. Dickwella played a poor stroke and got out scoring 95 runs. Chandimal and Kusal Mendis then took on the charge with some brilliant stroke play. Both of them made the batting look easy on a good batting pitch.

Kusal Mendis reached a quick-fire half-century off 30 balls while captain Dinesh Chandimal scored 50 off 49 balls. Both of them added 102 runs for the 3rd wicket before the former was dismissed for a well made 80. In the end. Akila Danajaya and Dhananjaya de Silva's partnership of 38 runs for the 7th wicket helped them to post a massive total of 366 for 6 in 50 overs. For England, Tom Curran and Moeen Ali took 2 wickets each while Adil Rashid and Liam Plunkett took 1 wicket each.

Chasing the target of 367 runs to win, England got off to a horrible start losing 3 quick wickets at the score of 4 runs with Jason Roy, Alex Hales, and captain Jos Buttler dismissed cheaply. Joe Root was also dismissed for just 10 runs and at the end of 10 overs, England were struggling at 41 for 4.

Ben Stokes was struggling with a leg injury but played with positive intent. The all-rounder reached his half-century off 45 balls added 79 runs for the 5th wicket with Moeen Ali before the Sri Lankan bowlers kept picking wickets at regular intervals. England were 132 for 9 when rain arrived. They eventually won the match by a massive 219 runs win via the DLS method. For Sri Lanka, Dananjaya took 4 wickets while Chameera took 3 wickets.

England won the five-match ODI series 3-1. It was a great performance by this English team who look solid in this format since the shock first round exit in the 2015 World Cup.

Dickwella was the man of the match for his superb 95.

Now, the action will move to the sole T20 match against England on 27th October.

Brief score:

Sri Lanka 366 for 6 in 50 overs ( Dickwella 95, Dinesh Chandimal 80, Sadeera 54, Kusal Mendis 56, Moeen Ali 2/57, Adil Rashid 1/52) beat

England 132 for 9 in 26.1 overs ( Ben Stokes 67, Moeen Ali 37, Akila Dananjaya 4/19, Chameera 3/20) by 219 runs via D/L method.