Australia turned to ever-effective part-time spinner Travis Head (1 for 31) for eight overs on day one, while left-arm tweaker Cooper Connolly (0 for 12) and seamer Beau Webster (0 for 13) both bowled three. But much of the heavy lifting was done by Nathan Lyon (3 for 78) and Matthew Kuhnemann (2 for 53) who each sent down 30 overs, as well as left-arm pacer Mitchell Starc (3 for 37).

Captain Steve Smith seemed to be short of a fourth frontline bowler suited to the conditions on day one, especially with Todd Murphy dropped for the second Test with all-rounder Connolly preferred. Australia bowling coach Dan Vettori explained the change to the XI after play yesterday.

First-innings runs are going to play a huge role in whoever wins this game. The anticipation that the wicket would probably be slightly more extreme than the first Test match, we thought that the number of overs would come down and maybe batting would come to the fore.

It’s an incredibly tough call on ‘Murph’ because I think whenever he’s come into the team, he’s done a fantastic job. It was just our interpretation of the wicket led us to believe that runs were going to be at a premium.

Australia may have a fight on their hands to seal a rare subcontinent series win against Sri Lanka after a see-sawing first day of the second Test in Galle.

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