Spin emerges as the real Test in Galle

It's the third day of the Test, second if you account for rain. Waves crash nearby and tiled rooves peep above fort walls. With king coconut vendors along the ground's periphery, and kites flying above the cricket, Galle should be a batting resort - a five-star, gourmet run-smorgasbord. Yet on the best customary day for run-making, 12 wickets have collapsed. The prodigies are prodding. The greats are groping. This pitch is no tropical paradise. It's a tawny-coloured bed of torture.

Of the 15 wickets to fall so far in the Test, nine have belonged to spinners. This is the Galle track's way. It takes turn on the first afternoon, then hand-grenades on the fourth and fifth day. The WACA ground tests nerve and reflexes; Kingsmead a batsman's skill against swing. But if you can't read the fizz out of a bowler's hand, buddy, don't bother coming to Galle.

Slow bowlers are sometimes patronised in modern cricket. "Hold up one end while the quicks hunt from the other," captains say. Seamers outnumber them in most attacks. Galle turns the tables, then takes slow-bowler love a step further. Teams would be right to stock their side with spin here, yet, seeing the surface, they reason: "Why would we need more than two on this track?"

The pitch cares for spinners of any persuasion. Shane Warne has a five-wicket haul here, but so does Nicky Boje. Muttiah Muralitharan still sends the track a Christmas card. One-hundred and thirty four overs into this match, two left-arm spinners, a pair of offies, and a wrist spinner, had all claimed wickets. None of those scalps had come from pitching into the barely-developed rough, though in the two days to come, that may change.

Mohammad Hafeez nailed Lahiru Thirimanne when the batsman came at him. Zulfiqar Babar couldn't dismiss Dinesh Chandimal with the balls that spat, so despite the work on the ball the track connived for one to slide on, and leg stump was left askew.

Misbah-ul-Haq brought Wahab Riaz back to bounce out the tail, but the surface had other ideas. Of the seven Sri Lanka wickets to fall on day two, only the first went to a quick. Yasir Shah had had even Kumar Sangakkara poking, but when he couldn't break through on day two, the pitch arranged two cheap scalps to send him off with more just reward for his skill. Pakistan's seam bowlers are among the best left-arm pairs in the world, yet when the second new ball was taken, it was Babar who made the leather come alive.

Azhar Ali's wicket came almost gift-wrapped for Rangana Herath, in Pakistan's innings. The batsman couldn't decide if he should step forward or slide back. He alternated between the two with middling results for 11 Herath balls, then surrendered on the 12th, moving only across.

Younis Khan, who had success in Galle on his last Sri Lanka trip, perhaps suffered the most emphatic dismissal of all. With three needed for his fifty, he ran at Dilruwan Perera. The bowler pulled his length back, and the ball floated out of Younis' reach like a butterfly escaping a net. The turn off the pitch ensured the ball hit the stumps. Younis shouldn't feel ashamed. Entire top orders have been undressed here. In 2012, New Zealand and Sri Lanka finished the first-innings neck-and-neck before Rangana Herath dismantled the opposition top order, and the visitors were rolled on the third day.

Misbah had made the unusual choice of bowling first on this track. This was largely because batting once represented Pakistan's only chance of winning the shortened match, but also because after the rains, a little extra moisture might make his seamers more potent. However, as Kaushal Silva attested, some strange perversion of the clay has instead lent menace to spin.

"It's spinning more than usual," he said. "Normally on the first day it doesn't spin much, but this time because of the moisture, it spun a bit more. Now it's turning a lot than the normal Galle pitches."

Good thing too, because in a match where four sessions have been lost to bad weather, a raging turner might still conspire a result. This venue has magicked victories out of thin air before, most recently last year, when Herath delivered a sublime spell against Pakistan, to set up an unforgettable fifth-evening finish.

That's the thing about tracks like this one. A cataclysmic stretch of play could always be around the corner. So keep on spinning, Galle. Keep on spitting and shooting out of the rough. It's a big-batted batsman's world out there. Cricket needs its filthy pits of fire