Sri Lanka’s Sonal Dinusha turned in an incredible feat of batting against India, etching his name in the history books during the second Test at the Sinhalese Sports Club in Colombo.
On Day 5, Dinusha scored his third century of the two-match Test series, making him only the third Sri Lankan batter to hit 3 hundreds during a two-match Test series. He scored his third hundred with a 2 against Mohammed Siraj during the first ball of the final session.
As he removed his helmet and held his bat aloft while his teammates stood in ovation to his achievement, his mother watched on from the grandstands.
Dinusha hit his third hundred of the series, having already hit 103 in the first innings of the second Test.
Sonal Dinusha Joins Elite List of Sri Lankan Batters
Dinusha has also joined the elite club of Sri Lankan batters who have scored a century in both innings in a Test against India.
Duleep Mendis was the first Sri Lankan to attain this, when he scored 105 & 105 at Chennai in 1982. Aravinda de Silva recorded a 146 & 120 at SSC, Colombo, in 1997.
Dinusha has now joined Mendis and de Silva in becoming the third Sri Lankan batter to score hundreds in each innings of a Test versus India.
Dinusha’s major records:
- Third Sri Lankan to score three Test centuries in a two-match series.
- Eighth Sri Lankan batter to register centuries in both innings of a Test.
- Joined Duleep Mendis and Aravinda de Silva to become only the third batter to score centuries in both innings of a Test against India.
- Only the ninth batter overall to hit three centuries in a two-match Test series.
- Third Sri Lankan batter to score 50+ scores in all four innings of the Test.
- Only Sri Lankan, and only the second batter after Andy Flower to score four 50+ scores in a Test against India
Dinusha Joins Aravinda de Silva and Other Greats
Along with those three centuries, Dinusha joined some of the Test giants. Aravinda de Silva scored three Test hundreds in a 2-match series against Pakistan in 1997, and again scored against India in the same year.
Other batters to have scored three hundreds in a two-match Test series include Jacques Kallis, Hashim Amla, Kumar Sangakkara, Younis Khan, Marnus Labuschagne and Kane Williamson.
Dinusha, who, on achieving this milestone, was unbeaten on 100, joins the series and records a place in Sri Lanka’s Test history.