Mathews key for Tigers and Lanka

Since rain played foul, washing out over two hours of the third days' play in the second and series deciding Test, Bangladesh will be eyeing to remove in-form Angelo Matthews on the fourth day. Mathews has reached a fifty and will hold the key for Sri Lanka as they look to take a first-innings lead for the visitors today.

The visitors trail another 83 runs in the first innings after the Bangladeshi bowlers did a decent job led by Shakib Al Hasan, who picked up three wickets. Pacer Ebadot Hossain bagged two while Sri Lanka ended the third day on 282 for five. Matthews once again looked solid and will resume on 58 alongside with Dinesh Chandimal (10 not out) on fourth day.

The Tigers' main aim will be to remove the dangerous Matthews early, especially after the experienced batter stood firm in the first Test, where he was dropped on 69 runs and went on to strike a mammoth 199 as the game ended in a draw.

According to Bangladesh's 2020 Under-19 World Cup-winning coach Navid Nawaz, who is currently Sri Lanka's assistant coach, there is a chance to get a result in the Test match if the pitch starts to spin in the next two days.

"At the moment, the game looks pretty even. But unfortunately we lost a couple of sessions to rain so tomorrow (Thursday) will be a crucial day. If the wicket can produce spin by the end of the fourth day and on the fifth day, I think there is a s possibility of a result in this Test match," Nawaz told the media yesterday.

He added that Sri Lanka were hoping to score quickly once they went past Bangladesh's first-innings total of 365 runs.

"That's what we are looking at. If things go well, we are looking to take the lead. But there is still a lot of hard work to be done. 83 runs is a lot. We just need to bat one more session without losing wickets. Once we get even, it's about how quickly we can score runs," he said.