'It was a good outing' - Jayawardene

Sri Lanka arrived in Adelaide less than a week ago promising aggression and focus as they bid for their first Test win on Australian soil. On the day they landed, their captain Mahela Jayawardene made it clear that to compete against Australia in any form they must be on the ball for at least four days of the five.

In the first warm-up match against the Chairman's XI in Adelaide, they could not even concentrate for four sessions as their fielding fell apart over the last two of the three days. Five catches were dropped, with Jayawardene culpable in two instances - missing sitters at second and leg slip. He admitted that it was a "bad habit" the players must shake off, but was keen to downplay the fielding and happy to put it behind them.

"It was just a lack of concentration," Jayawardene said after the game ended in a draw. "We've had a long chat about it yesterday and today as well. The guys concentrate a lot on the batting and the bowling but it's just on the field it seems to not have the same kind of concentration which is a bad habit obviously. We just need to make sure we don't get into these kind of things, especially when playing Australia."

He was candid, too, about his batting performance which involved a first-innings duck and a fair fifty, with both innings ending in the softest of dismissals, popping up on the off side. "The first innings was a shambles the way I got out. I just wanted to spend some time out there in the middle. The way I was hitting the ball, that was pretty good, but towards the end I was just trying to do a few too many things."

And he took away some positives - "The way Sanath [Jayasuriya] played and the way we handled the conditions. A bit of a tough start, losing a bowler [Chanaka Welegedera] early wasn't the best thing because we didn't want to tax a lot of guys as well, we just wanted to get them into a rhythm."

The biggest plus was Muttiah Muralitharan who took four wickets. Jayawardene confirmed Murali was "100 per cent" and would be rested for the warm-up. Malinga Bandara will come in to replace him for the tour match in Queensland. "He bowled pretty well, I was very happy with that - all in all it was a good outing for us."

That may be, but Kumar Sangakkara was injured in the process - tearing his left hamstring while batting. Chanaka Welegedera also tore his right quadricep muscle and will have a replacement - Sujeewa de Silva - flown in for him, hopefully in time for the next tour match which begins on Friday.