If England can take the risk of attacking the Sri Lankan batting today, they have an excellent chance of winning this match following more poor captaincy from Hashan Tillakaratne.

England resume this morning on 259-8 after the home skipper allowed them to escape from 139-5 with the sort of negative field placings that prevented Sri Lanka from winning either of the first two Tests.

Another 20 runs will start to turn the screw on Sri Lanka, who have looked increasingly bereft of confidence and will clearly not want to chase any total above 150 when they bat last.

England have strengthened their bowling attack by bringing back James Anderson for Paul Collingwood, and need the seamers to take advantage of a pitch that offers some bounce.

While England have tried to take the initiative in this match, helped by winning the toss at last, Sri Lanka have shown that the problem with having a genius like Muttiah Muralitharan in the side is that his team-mates and captain can rely too heavily on him.

When Marcus Trescothick was hitting the seamers to all parts in reaching a half-

cen-tury off 40 balls, Tillakaratne looked to have no idea how to stop him. Then he threw the ball to Murali and was rewarded with Trescothick's wicket to the last ball before lunch.

Trescothick had looked certain to reach his third Test century against Sri Lanka but, without Murali, England would probably be leading this series and their attempts to force the pace have been tempered by his ability to take a wicket at any time.

When his seamers sent back Mark Butcher and Nasser Hussain and Murali dismissed Graham Thorpe, England had lost four wickets for 31 runs, and the decision to play the extra bowler had left the tail dangerously exposed. One more wicket would have negated England's advantage in batting first and left them unlikely to make 200, but Tillakaratne released the pressure. He failed to crowd men around Andrew Flintoff, who made 0 and 1 in the last Test and looked lost against the spinners, and allowed the all-rounder to play himself in.

With his confidence restored, Flintoff went on the rampage, hammering 10 boundaries and four 6s and ensuring England would reach a respectable total as he and Gareth Batty added 87 for the sixth wicket.

Tillakaratne just kept Murali wheeling away, hoping he would conjure up something but failed to give his bowler any back-up. Batty kept Murali out while Flintoff shredded the lesser spinners and control simply drifted away from Sri Lanka.

The partnership was broken when Batty dragged a long hop to midwicket and 10 runs later, Flintoff was caught and bowled with 45 minutes' play remaining. Flintoff should perhaps have played for the morning but he showed the growing confidence in the English side and put the craven effort of the Sri Lankans into perspective.

Duncan Fletcher will no doubt have praised Trescothick and Flintoff for England's most vigorous batting of the series, but would have reminded them that both were out with the job half done.

Two years ago, Thorpe's century on this ground set up victory in the series, and had either Trescothick or Flintoff con- verted their start into three figures, this match would be all but settled.

Instead of looking to finish off the tail after Flintoff's dismissal, Tillakaratne delayed taking the second new ball, and when he finally yielded to what seemed to be pressure from his players, Ashley Giles was run out in a mix-up with Chris Read.

Murali finished the day with 3-37 off 38 overs and England will take satisfaction in forcing him to bowl for so long to take his wickets with have further eroded the home side's self-belief.

They can exploit that this morning as the Sri Lankan top order is short of runs, with the top three having contributed just one half-century in the series. They must achieve a first-innings lead and that responsibility is tough for players who are out of form. England lack a talent of Murali's stature but their collective effort with bat and ball has compensated for this.