Vaas and Muralitharan - rhythm and explosion

No team in history can have owed so much to two more different bowlers than Muttiah Muralitharan and Chaminda Vaas. Between them, they have accounted for nearly 1500 international wickets, and as their skills have developed over the past decade, Sri Lanka has leapt towards the top of the Test table.

They are a partnership of extreme opposites. Vaas, the quiet unassuming left-arm swing bowler, whose immaculate rhythm enables him to boomerang past the sturdiest defences in world cricket, and Murali, the ever-smiling spinner whose bamboozling talents have propelled him to the very summit of the game. On May 8, 2004, against Zimbabwe at Harare, Murali took his 520th Test wicket to set a new world record, and at the age of 32, his best years may yet be ahead of him.

Together, Murali and Vaas have pushed back Sri Lanka's boundaries, and given their team a potency that they could never have imagined when they took their first steps as a Test nation back in 1982.

Importantly they have also proved successful overseas, which is often the benchmark of the finest teams. As a 20-year-old playing in only his fifth Test, Vaas took 10 wickets to beat New Zealand on their own turf, while Murali's apogee came at The Oval in 1998, when he ripped England to pieces with 16 wickets in the match.