Get your Cricket Free Bets registered ready for the coming tests with England against Sri Lanka as Steve Harmison and Matthew Hoggard fight to get fit and to fighting form to face the host nation in the coming series.

Spin always plays a part and from the Sri Lankans’ point of view and they’ll try to exploit the pitches. We’ve got great spin bowlers to counter this part of their armoury but I can’t help feeling that these coming tests may be decided by pace and who can take the wickets whilst the spinners take a break.

The pace men won’t get too much assistance from the pitches which makes me feel that Steve Harmison will be nullified as he will lose his main weapon of bounce and he doesn’t move it very much laterally. Mallinger to me will be one of the key bowlers in this series because he has mastered the yorker. This means he will take the pitch out of the equation and fire those 90 mph toe crunchers at the english batsmen on a regular basis. I’m sure Peter Moores has thought this through but let’s see how the players defend against Mallinger when they are out in the middle and the pressure (as well as the heat!) is on.