“Day 3 we shot ourselves in the foot, wouldn’t say it was complacency” – Ollie Pope on England’s loss to Sri Lanka in 3rd Test

England stand-in skipper Ollie Pope admitted the third day’s batting performance led to their downfall after their eight wicket loss against Sri Lanka in the third Test match at the Kennington Oval, London. England were able to take a 62-run lead after Sri Lanka were skittled out for 263 in response to the home team’s score of 325 in the first innings.

The hosts had a great opportunity to build on their lead but they were bundled out for a paltry score of 156 runs. England’s wicket-keeper-bat Jamie Smith top-scored with 67 runs but none of the other batters could show any resistance.

The next best score for England was 35 by opener Dan Lawrence and seven batters were dismissed without even reaching the two-digit mark. Lahiru Kumara and Vishwa Fernando scalped four and three wickets respectively.

“Disappointing not to be on the right side of the result today. Day three we shot ourselves in the foot, we were not at our best. Wouldn’t say it was complacency. It has been a long summer but that is not the reason. It was just one of those days (day three) where it didn’t come off. We want to keep learning, bettering ourselves and moving forward and I think we have done that this summer,” Pope said during the post-match presentation.

Pope added he loved the captaincy challenge in the absence of Ben Stokes, who was earlier ruled out of the series due to a hamstring injury.

“Loved being captain. Obviously when Stokesy is back he will step back in but it has been an honour. Disappointing not to win today but we have won five out of six Tests this summer,” Pope said.

England will next take on arch-rivals Australia in three T20Is and five ODIs while playing at home.