On the second morning, Zimbabwe’s bowlers found their discipline. On a placid Harare surface, offering nothing to seam or spin, the bowlers combined to choke Sri Lanka’s run-rate for a majority of the morning session. Sri Lanka still managed to accumulate 80 runs in 30 overs on an attritional second morning. Upul Tharanga carried on to make his sixth test fifty, his unbeaten 51 helped Sri Lanka to 397 for 5 at lunch.
Seamers Chris Mpofu and Carl Mumba began the day by hanging the ball well outside the off stump, asking overnight batsmen Tharanga and Dhananjaya de Silva to fetch their runs. The batsmen were content in seeing off their opening spell, occasionally wafting at the bowlers’ inviting lines. Both teams were satisfied with the start.
In their recent Test series against New Zealand, Zimbabwe’s bowlers displayed competence in consistency but weren’t able to ‘bore’ batsmen for long enough. Newly appointed coach Heath Streak may have already turned that around. Barring the sporadic overpitched delivery, the bowlers repeatedly hit the same lines and lengths through the session. Zimbabwe conceded just 50 runs in the first 24 overs of the morning.
