Bangladesh U-Turn for Angelo Mathews- From Timing Him Out to Congratulating Him on Retirement [WATCH]

Bangladesh players congratulated Sri Lanka’s Angelo Mathews on Day five of the first Test between the two teams in Galle on Saturday after the veteran all-rounder played his final Test innings.

Bangladesh players congratulate Angelo Mathews

Angelo Mathews had announced that he would be retiring from Test cricket after the conclusion of the first Test against Bangladesh.
Bangladesh’s gesture for Angelo Mathews was in stark contrast to his controversial “timed out dismissal” when the two Asian giants squared off in the league stage of the 2023 ODI World Cup that took place in India.

In that match, Angelo Mathews was dismissed via a “time-out” after he took more than two minutes to take strike because of a helmet malfunction. In that match, the then Bangladesh skipper Shakib-al-Hasan had argued with the umpires that Angelo Mathews had taken a lot of time to take his position at the crease. Angelo Mathews was given timed out controversially as it raised a big debate among the cricketing fraternity.

However, Bangladesh players seemed to have moved on from that incident as they congratulated Mathews on a stellar Test career.

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Sri Lanka, Bangladesh play out draw

Coming back to the first Test, Angelo Mathews scored 39 runs from 69 balls, hitting three fours and one six, during the first innings. Apart from Mathews, Pathum Nissanka (187), Dinesh Chandimal (54), Kamindu Mendis (87) and Milan Rathnayake (39) played valuable knocks to help Sri Lanka opost 485 in reply to Bangladesh’s first innings total of 495.

The visitors then took a lead of 10 runs into the second innings and declared at 285/5 following an unbeaten 125 from skipper Najmul Hossain Shanto.

The match was frequently interrupted due to rain which meant that a draw was looming at one point. In their run chase, Sri Lanka finished Day five with a total of 72/4 with Kamindu Mendis and skipper Dhananjaya de Silva both remaining not out on 12. Taijul Islam was the pick of the bowlers with figures of 3/23.

Angelo Mathews’ Test career

Angelo Mathews finishes his 16-year Test career with 8214 runs from 212 innings at an average of 44.4. He registered 45 half-centuries and 16 centuries in the longest format. He also registered a double century against Zimbabwe in Harare in 2020. In Sri Lanka, the 38-year-old played 67 Tests and scored 4370 runs at an average of 44.59.

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