Friday, March 8, 2002 Kumara Sangakkara has many skills. He is sharp enough to study for a law degree and read Murali's variations. He enjoys agitation, a trait that made him one of the least loved players on England's tour of Sri Lanka last year. He is only 24. And he bats in the top three.

Sri Lanka's batsmen are either silky or strong-armed, and Sangakkara joins Sanath Jayasuria in the latter category. If he had added three more runs to his 230 in the first innings of this week's Asian Test Championship final, Sangakkara would have grabbed the world record for the highest score by a wicketkeeper in Test cricket, held by Andy Flower (232 at Nagpur in 2000-01). The future looks bleak for the good old-fashioned stumper who kept like a dream and batted in the top six only if he was a nightwatchman. Australia, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka also have keepers who are frontline batsmen. So would England, if they dared to pick Alec Stewart.

Sangakkara has an interesting batting style. His first movement is back and across, but his front foot does not follow. Instead it stays pretty much where it is, leaving him square-on when he plays the ball. Bishan Bedi would not approve. He barely gets forward, driving with his front foot little further down the wicket than the popping crease. Most of his 230, unsurprisingly, came from back-foot strokes.

This is a technique that relies on exquisite hand-eye co-ordination and works a treat on the slow wickets of Asia. Sangakkara has now made four hundreds in his 20 Tests, and the other three all came in Sri Lanka. In his last 11 Tests he averages 76.15. An impressive record, but many Asian batsmen with this technique have been horribly exposed on more bowler-friendly wickets.

For my money, Sri Lanka's batting star is not Sangakkara, nor is it Jayasuriya. The man England should really fear is another 24-year-old, Mahela Jayawardene. While Sangakkara smashed and smote at Lahore this week, bat swishing away from body, Jayawardene contemptuously stroked a rapid half-century that sent Pakistan into a tailspin. The contrast could not have been more vivid. Jayawardene is from the silky school of Sri Lankan batsmanship. He is classically side-on, so slight that the bowler hardly sees any of him, but then his feet fall softly into place and his bat arcs smoothly to dispatch the ball with grace and timing.

Jayawardene too has a princely record in recent months: 65 in 13 Tests since England arrived in Sri Lanka a year ago. But in his career, he has made only 522 runs overseas at an average of 29. Both he and Sangakkara have to prove that they are more than flat-track bullies. We will find out more about them when Caddick and Flintoff are digging it in on a greentop at Lord's in May.

Kamran Abbasi, born in Lahore, brought up in Rotherham, is assistant editor of the British Medical Journal. His Asian View appears on Wisden.com every Friday.

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