England Save Match in Galle Thriller

The tail withstood the Sri Lankan spinners for three hours on a surface providing prodigious turn amid high tension.

In the end it boiled down to Matthew Hoggard blocking the final over, the 107th of the day, from Muttiah Muralitharan to confirm the result.

They lost only two wickets in the final session, to close on 210 for nine, when Ashley Giles and Hoggard accepted the offer of bad light from umpires Drayl Harper and Srinivas Venkataraghavan.

The officials convened on more than half-a-dozen occasions prior to that due to the murky weather and England's batsmen also changed gloves regularly and called for water as they sought to survive.

Giles saw out the entire 102 minutes after tea and he left the field to huge roars from the travelling support at 5.42pm local time. An evening shower seven minutes later all-but confirmed Sri Lanka's failure to finish the job.

The drama heightened when Richard Johnson, who spent 40 minutes in defiance, succumbed to man-of-the-match Muttiah Muralitharan in unfortunate circumstances - inside-edging into leg stump.

That left Hoggard to block out an entire over from Murali, who finished with 11 wickets in the match, and the Yorkshire fast bowler stood firm.

Nerves had increased, with light fading, when Gareth Batty fell three-quarters-of-an-hour after tea, attempting to smear Muralitharan to midwicket despite the need for crease occupation.

Batty had defended stoutly for more than an hour, mixing that with occasional aggression which saw him loft one six and pull two fours.

Needing an improbable 323 for victory, England must have been praying for the rain to return when Andrew Flintoff, on his 26th birthday, was dismissed, slicing to point, at 2.20pm.

That left England 125 for five, a total built around Mark Butcher's second half-century of the match.

Butcher's departure among four afternoon wickets put the tourists' chances of seeing out the minimum 98 overs in day in jeopardy.

But the lower order proved as resilient as the some of the batsmen had proved loose earlier in the day.

Butcher reached his second fifty of the match from 122 balls when he used his feet to straight-drive Muttiah Muralitharan down the ground for four.

The Surrey left-hander hit seven boundaries in all, including a six over mid-on off Kumar Dharmasena, but was dismissed soon afterwards when left-arm seamer Chaminda Vaas found the outside edge.

That ended a 52-run partnership with debutant Paul Collingwood, who dug in for three hours, including 45 minutes after Butcher's departure.

Read slog-swept a six off Murali and survived a leg before appeal the following delivery but Murali got his man shortly after gaining enough bounce to clip Read's glove, after initial contact with pad, and Mahela Jayawardene held the catch at short-leg.

Collingwood eventually fell to another fine catch from Tillekeratne, this time one-handed diving to his left at silly-point, off Kumar Dharmasena, shortly before tea, which was taken at 171 for seven.

England lost three wickets on the final morning: Michael Vaughan succumbed to a fine delivery from debutant Dinusha Fernando while Marcus Trescothick and Graham Thorpe both brought about their own downfalls with rash attacking shots.

Vaughan, who survived a confident appeal for a catch in the slips from the first ball of the day, was forced to play at a perfectly-pitched outswinger from Fernando and Hashan Tillekeratne completed the dismissal, holding the catch at first slip at the second attempt.

Trescothick charged Jayasuriya's left-arm spin and was bowled, then Murali dismissed Thorpe when an attempted heave to midwicket spiralled to Vaas at mid-on.

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