The main event: Flintoff v Murali?

It has already been a winter of hard work for England's cricketers, and that was just to get past the easy bit. But now, with Bangladesh successfully put to one side, and the West Indies tour still a dot on the horizon, it is time to get stuck into arguably the toughest six weeks of England's three-pronged campaign.

The heat and humidity of Dhaka and Chittagong might have seemed oppressive, but it is as nothing compared to the furnace that awaits England at Dambulla tomorrow, where their tour of Sri Lanka will begin in earnest. Up till now, England's gravest threat has come from the elements (and their own fears of an upset). Tomorrow, however, they face a side that is brimful of talent, and more importantly, one that is gunning for vengeance after the last, fractious, tour early in 2001.

On that occasion, England had already wrapped up an historic 2-1 Test series win by the time the one-day circus came to town, and they treated the three matches as something of an afterthought. Nasser Hussain had already flown home early to reap the plaudits of back-to-back series victories in the subcontinent, and in his absence, England were led to a 3-0 defeat by Graham Thorpe. But the current England squad takes its one-day cricket far more seriously than it did back then. A repeat performance would be a massive disappointment.

England were the opponents in Dambulla's inaugural fixture, on March 23, 2001, and for the second time in two tours they will be facing an unknown quantity at the venue. A belated decision was taken this month to install floodlights at the ground - they only received the OK on Thursday - and, after Sri Lanka had tested the conditions in a warm-up game on Saturday, their captain Marvan Atapattu gave them a guarded thumbs-up.

"The floodlights were OK," said Atapattu. "But personally, I did not feel they were as bright as the ones at the Premadasa [in Colombo]. There was also a bit of dew later on, which will be a factor. My feeling is that the ball will move around a bit more in the early evening." The toss, in other words, will be crucial. The match starts at 0830 GMT.

With the onus on seam bowling, Sri Lanka have already indicated that they will be giving a debut to their 21-year-old quickie, Nuwan Kulasekara, as back-up to the established new-ball pairing of Chaminda Vaas and Nuwan Zoysa. England, on the other hand, are unlikely to jeopardise the balance of their batting by including James Kirtley at the expense of one of the spinners, but one change that is highly likely is a new opening partner for Marcus Trescothick.

Vikram Solanki looked to have cracked international cricket when he laced a wonderful century at The Oval last summer, but he was all at sea against Bangladesh last week, scoring only 11 runs in his three innings. He followed that up with a fifth-ball duck in Saturday's warm-up game, and it cannot be long before Andrew Strauss is given an opportunity to prove his mettle. By his own admission, Strauss will never be a big hitter in the mould of Trescothick or Andrew Flintoff, but his 83 from 88 balls on Saturday was not the effort of a sluggard.

No series against Sri Lanka, however, can be contemplated without due deference to Muttiah Muralitharan. "He is the best spinner in the world today," said Trescothick, one of a posse of left-handers who got the better of him last time around. "We have our game-plans for combatting him, and without giving too much away, it's about countering his spin, not nullifying him completely."

That is just as well, because Flintoff, England's man of the moment, doesn't know the meaning of the word "nullify". Flintoff and Murali are two good friends from their days at Lancashire, and when they come across each other in the middle, it promises to be a contest to savour. It might even be the defining contest. For years, Sri Lanka have been accused of being a one-man side. In Bangladesh last week, so were England. If one or other gets the upper hand in the coming days, it will serve as a potent marker for the rest of the tour.

Sri Lanka (probable): 1 Sanath Jayasuriya, 2 Romesh Kaluwitharana (wk), 3 Marvan Atapattu (capt), 4 Mahela Jayawardene, 5 Kumar Sangakkara, 6 Russel Arnold, 7 Upul Chandana, 8 Chaminda Vaas, 9 Nuwan Zoysa, 10 Muttiah Muralitharan, 11 Nuwan Kulasekara.

England (probable): 1 Marcus Trescothick, 2 Andrew Strauss, 3 Michael Vaughan (capt), 4 Paul Collingwood, 5 Andrew Flintoff, 6 Rikki Clarke, 7 Chris Read (wk), 8 Ashley Giles, 9 Gareth Batty, 10 Richard Johnson, 11 James Anderson.