Mendis has been decoded
Sri Lanka without Muttiah Muralitharan are like Queen without Freddie Mercury, Mike Selvey writes in the Guardian
Mendis will have been scrutinised microscopically. From it will have come the realisation that in a form of the game where there is no imperative to force the pace, there is nothing so mysterious about Mendis at all. " Get forward," is the mantra, "and play him as an off-spin bowler." Simple and, if the statistics are to be believed, effective, for since that debut series, 13 matches have thus far brought him 36 more wickets at 41 runs apiece. The batsmen have got his measure now.
Dustin Silgardo is a former sub-editor at ESPNcricinfo