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Lyon frank about Australian deficiencies
- Updated: August 7, 2016
Over the past few days, the only player singled out for criticism from Australia’s coach Darren Lehmann and captain Steven Smith has been Nathan Lyon, the touring side’s No. 1 spinner. If this seems harsh that’s because it probably is – Lyon’s nine wickets place him second behind Mitchell Starc among Australian bowlers; his 29 runs means he’s made only five fewer than Joe Burns and six fewer than Peter Nevill.
But the reason for the criticism stems from the fact that Lyon’s returns are paltry next to those of Rangana Herath, Dilruwan Perera and Lakshan Sandakan, the Sri Lankan spin trio who have made fools of a highly paid and seemingly well-prepared Australian batting line-up. The struggles of the batsmen have left Lyon and the rest of the bowlers with precious little scoreboard pressure on their side. Lyon, though, did not fall into excuses or the shifting of blame.
“We’ve been outplayed in all areas,” Lyon said in Galle. “I’m not going to stand here and make excuses or blame anyone. We’ve been outplayed and you’ve got to give credit where credit’s due. They’ve totally outplayed us. Yeah it’d be great to bowl with some runs on the board but that’s up to Nos. 1 down to 11 to get those runs.”
Lyon spoke of four issues that have contributed to Australian struggles. First he admitted that he and his slow-bowling partner Jon Holland have failed to challenge Sri Lanka’s batsmen down the line of the stumps frequently enough. This angle of attack has been responsible for the majority of Australian dismissals, but precious few among the hosts.
“As spinners, we need to keep hitting the stumps,” Lyon said. “If you look at their spinners, that’s what they do really well, they ask questions off the stumps. If I’m being honest enough, I don’t think Duck [Holland] and myself probably did that to the best of our ability in the last Test match. You’ve got to give credit where credit’s due. Sri Lanka plays spin really well.
“They know the …
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