Run-machine Saud Shakeel puts Pakistan on top with brilliant hundred

Saud Shakeel continued his strong run of form by posting a second century and helping usher Pakistan to a narrow first-innings lead at lunch on Day 3 of the series-opening Test against Sri Lanka.

The left-handed batter was unbeaten on 119 as Pakistan reached the first interval Tuesday at 313-6, a lead of one run after a rain-affected morning session at Galle.

Shakeel made his Test debut last December and now has posted two centuries and five half-centuries in just six matches at a Bradmanesque average of 87.

After resuming on the overnight score of 69, Shakeel is now getting closer to his career-best Test score of 125.

Pakistan wasn't sitting so comfortably when it was reduced to 101-5 on Day 2, but a record 177-run partnership between Agha Salman and Shakeel rescued the visitors' innings.

The sixth-wicket pair put on a record for Pakistan in Tests against Sri Lanka, improving on the 173-run partnership between Sarfaraz Ahmed and Asad Shafiq at Dubai in 2017.

Pakistan’s conventional style of batting in the previous cycle of the ICC's Test Championship earned the team some criticism, and they seem to have taken England’s example in response by scoring at times at a rate of almost five runs an over.

Both batters were not afraid to use their feet to the spinners and punished the loose deliveries, pushing Sri Lanka into defensive mindset.

The first over that Ramesh Mendis bowled in the day proved to be an eventful one. Shakeel was dropped on 93 and then, three balls later, he completed his hundred. On the last ball of that over, Agha Salman was stumped after scoring 83 off 113 deliveries with nine fours and one six.