Aussies look lost against spin: Mathews

As Australia search for answers to their growing subcontinental woes, triumphant Sri Lanka skipper Angelo Mathews admits the tourists appear lost against the home side’s rampaging spin brigade.

The No.1 ranked Australians – at least for the time being - have now lost 36 of their 40 wickets in the series to the spin of Rangana Herath, Lakshan Sandakan, Dhananjaya de Silva and Dilruwan Perera.

Key Australian batsmen find themselves at the mercy of the highly-skilled and varied Sri Lankan attack.

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Spin spearhead Herath is currently dominating the pivotal battle against the world’s top-ranked Test batsman Steve Smith, with the Australian skipper averaging just 15.67 in the 16 overs he has faced from the wily veteran this series.

However, the numbers become more concerning when looking at some of the captain’s top-order teammates.

Opener Joe Burns has been dismissed three times for just 28 runs against 10.3 overs of spin, while Usman Khawaja has now been spun out on four occasions for 35 runs in 14 bamboozling overs across Kandy and now Galle. 

"They look a bit lost when it comes to our spinners," Mathews said after the series-clinching thrashing.

"It's never easy when you’re facing good quality spin on a turner like that. We have good quality spinners.

"They know exactly how to bowl on these kinds of wickets.

"Sometimes when we go to overseas conditions we struggle as well. They have struggled in the last two games.

"We are not writing them off. We want to win three-nil. We want to go for it in Colombo as well."

While a dead rubber in Colombo is still to come, the post-mortem has already begun for the Australian brains trust.

National Selector Rod Marsh and Bupa Support Team head coach Darren Lehmann have already conceded they’re unsure of what else can be done off the field to improve a record that has now seen Australia win just one of their past 17 Tests in Asia.

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While the powers that be investigate any and all solutions for rectifying a problem that seemingly won’t go away, Smith suggests it might be time to look into picking specialist batsmen for the spinning conditions.

"Yeah it certainly needs to be looked at," the captain admitted. "If there are guys that can play spin well in these conditions then it's certainly got to be a chance.

"It's been too long now, so whatever we're doing it's not working.

"So yeah, there might be a need for some changes."

Australia will tomorrow return to Galle International Stadium for an optional training session on what should have been day four of the Test.

Mathews said he was ‘sure’ the visitors would make at least one change for the series finale, but 33-year-old Shaun Marsh is the only specialist batsman currently in the squad that’s not in the heat of battle.

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The selection speculation will no doubt continue to play out ahead of the Colombo clash starting next Saturday, but Smith believes there were positive signs early on ultimately became the Test’s final day.

"As battters, I assume the wicket is going to spin again,” Smith said after the first Test in 19 years that an Australian batsman hasn’t notched a half century.

"So I think it's about implementing the plans that the guys had in place today.

"I think they played with some courage today - sweeping the ball, reverse sweeping, coming down the wicket.

"It's those sort of things that enable you to score. If you just sit there and try to defend one's eventually going to have your name on it and you're not going to get any runs at the same time.

"The name of our game is to score runs, so you’ve got to try to do that. But do it in a way where you can be successful.

"I though some of the guys' plans today were pretty good in the way they executed them was good.

"It's just about doing that for longer periods of time."