Mominul Haque’s side went with a rare six-five batter-bowler combination © BCB
Bangladesh chose to bat vs Sri Lanka
Bangladesh captain Mominul Haque opted to bat first against Sri Lanka in the first Test in Pallekele. The visitors picked a rare six-five batter-bowler combination by selecting Abu Jayed, Taskin Ahmed and Ebadat Hossain in the three-man pace attack, apart from the spinners Mehidy Hasan Miraz and Taijul Islam.
They also included Saif Hassan as Tamim Iqbal’s opening partner, while dropping Mohammad Mithun from the middle-order. Nayeem Hasan and Soumya Sarkar were already axed from the squad.
The home side went for Angelo Mathews in place of Dinesh Chandimal, who had an ordinary tour of West Indies, while also including Lahiru Kumara to replace the missing Dushmantha Chameera.
Sri Lanka: 1 Dimuth Karunaratne (capt), 2 Lahiru Thirimanne, 3 Oshada Fernando, 4 Pathum Nissanka, 5 Angelo Mathews, 6 Dhananjaya de Silva, 7 Niroshan Dickwella (wk), 8 Wanindu Hasaranga, 9 Suranga Lakmal, 10 Lahiru Kumara, 11 Vishwa Fernando
Bangladesh: 1 Tamim Iqbal, 2 Saif Hassan, 3 Najmul Hossain Shanto, 4 Mominul Haque (capt), 5 Mushfiqur Rahim, 6 Liton Das (wk), 7 Mehidy Hasan Miraz, 8 Taijul Islam, 9 Taskin Ahmed, 10 Abu Jayed, 11 Ebadat Hossain
Mohammad Isam is ESPNcricinfo’s Bangladesh correspondent. @isam84
© ESPN Sports Media Ltd.
Source: ESPN Crickinfo