Clinical Australia claim ODI series 4-1

David Warner crowned his first series win as Australia captain with a century that set a new benchmark and banished some old demons as he led his team to another hefty win over Sri Lanka.

Having endured a lean trot during the Test match whitewash (163 runs at 27.16) and the first four ODIs (38 at 9.5), Warner capped off a trying couple of months with a landmark 106 as Australia chased down Sri Lanka's 195 with five wickets and seven overs to spare.

It capped a meticulous captain's effort from the 29-year-old in his third, undefeated outing as skipper with his only misstep – as he castigated himself for repeatedly – being his dismissal with seven runs of victory when he offered a tired return catch after almost three hours of batting.

While the afterglow of the success was dimmed considerably by news that both Aaron Finch and squad member Chris Lynn had sustained significant injuries, the victory itself also placed the Test series in sharper focus, with the ODI outfit – like their red-ball brethren before them – arriving on the island as the world's top-ranked team only to meet markedly different fates.

The challenge for Australia now is to somehow apply the successful template for ODI cricket in Asia, where their recent record is unsurpassed, and apply to the elite form where it is unquestionably diabolical.

The implementation of the limited-overs fielding restrictions that dissuades teams from crowding close catchers around the bat is certainly one aspect that helped to swing the result.

Despite the seeming inadequacy of Sri Lanka's total on what defied outward appearance to be the most batter-friendly of a bowler-dominated series, Australia's pursuit began with the now customary subcontinental stumble.

Stand-in opener Matthew Wade, summoned to the top of the order because of the finger injury Aaron Finch sustained trying to clutch a scorching slips catch, fell to spin in the sixth over.

And Usman Khawaja's forgettable tour, which was to have ended tonight but has been extended to possibly a pair of T20 Internationals due to another finger injury suffered by Shaun Marsh, yielded another single-figure score.

Caught at point from a looping leading edge after he tried to flick off-spinner Dilruwan Perera over the on-side in-field, the sort of luckless dismissal that summed up Khawaja's campaign in a couple of seconds of escalating frustration and thwarted ambition.

If 2-25 in the sixth over was daunting for Warner and George Bailey, Australia's best batter and the Player of the Tournament in this ultimately lopsided series, then it only showed occasionally.

The near misses and pockets of fortune that had so repeatedly eluded the Australians during the Tests all fell Australia's way, with Warner edging past the ‘keeper's gloves and Bailey somehow avoiding having his stumps rattled a couple of times.

Bailey's 111-minute struggle ended on 43 when he missed a conventional sweep, but the 132-run stand they fashioned for the third wicket ultimately decided the match.

Warner's hard-fought individual triumph, on the Father's Day when he was named Australia's Sports Dad of the Year, came just 30 runs shy of the finish line when he nudged a single to square leg to reach his hundred off 111 balls.

In addition to becoming the first Australia batsman to post an ODI century in Sri Lanka – the previous nearest was Mark Taylor's 94 in 1992 – Warner also stands as the only Australia ODI captain to boast a 100 per cent winning record having led his country in at least three matches.

Perhaps more remarkably, Australia's 4-1 reversal in the white-ball format after copping a 3-0 whitewash in the Tests underscored how starkly contrasting are the nation's capabilities using the red and white balls in Asian conditions.

While Test match cricket on subcontinental pitches remains as unfathomable to Australians as the local dialects, their 50-over results over the past five years have been quite outstanding.

With 12 wins from 18 ODIs in that period, Australia's winning ratio of 66.67 per cent exceeds even India in Asia (65.52) and is markedly superior to Bangladesh (52.08), Afghanistan (51.65), Sri Lanka (50) and Pakistan (44.43).

Not that tonight's win in front of a lively but ultimately absent crowd at Pallekele came in a canter.

In keeping with the revolving door selection the home team has employed throughout this Qantas Tour, Sri Lanka employed their fourth opening combination in five ODI matches and finally found one that clicked.

Or, at least, one that was able to see out the opening over from Mitchell Starc without suffering a casualty.

Starc did end up with a first-over wicket, but it was at the outset of his second spell – the 16th over of the innings – and by that stage the home team had rattled up their best start of the series, albeit in a dead-rubber match.

Indeed, the 78-run opening stand fashioned by boldly aggressive new pair Dhananjaya de Silva (34 off 47 balls) and Danushka Ganathilaka (39 off 40) was more than three-times better than the combined aggregate of Sri Lanka's first-wicket efforts in the previous four matches.

Largely because, despite its cracked and dry appearance that resembled a day-four Test wicket, the Pallekele offered true bounce (if little pace) and batters were able to flay the bat at anything too full, too wide and too short.

As de Silva and Gunathilaka did regularly to the delight of the euphoric, dancing crowd that packed the grass banks of the bucolic stadium utterly undaunted by the notion the series was already decided.

It wasn't until de Silva holed out to mid-on trying to lift James Faulkner beyond the in-field in the 14th over that the celebrating skipped a beat.

Although from there, the dance moves were curtailed by a hat-trick of deathly silences as the Sri Lankans lost three wickets in as many overs and the world champions brought a bit more familiarity to the scoreline.

It also represented another triumph for David Warner's feel for captaincy, recognising that Adam Zampa's dismissal of Gunathilaka brought to the crease his fellow stand-in skipper – and Sri Lanka's best-performed batter of the series – Dinesh Chandimal.

Warner immediately summoned Starc back into the attack sensing that with two fresh batters at the crease a third strike might expose a comparatively inexperienced middle-order, and was proved right when Chandimal edged the third ball he faced.

Which was pretty much the same position the Sri Lankans have found themselves in every match of the series.

Despite winning the toss on all but one occasion in the ODIs (after Steve Smith called wrong in all three Tests) and batting first in every international outing of the tour, Sri Lanka's first five wickets in the limited-overs format have averaged 136 across all five games.

Today they were reduced to 5-129 when Warner's leadership nous again delivered an almost immediate return.

Having utilised the over-worked Starc initially in a three-over spell and then just a pair of overs to remove Chandimal before he was rested again, Warner turned to part-time off-spinner Travis Head when left-handed pair Upal Tharanga and Kusal Perera were brought together.

The plan to have the off-spinner turning the ball away from the left-handers worked flawlessly when Head tempted Tharanga to drive at a ball that held up on the slow surface but turned sufficiently to catch the outside of the bat and slice waist-high to backward point.

That dismissal was Warner's cue to bring back Starc for another crack, putting in place a slip despite it being the 24th over in the belief that there was still sufficient bounce in the surface and movement with the ball to generate an edge.

As was proved with Starc's fourth delivery that was fast and full and sufficiently wide for Perera to wave a leaden-footed drive that went low and quickly towards the right ankle of Aaron Finch who was unable to get sufficient flesh on the ball to prevent it racing to the rope.

But enough of his index finger to inflict some damage, which saw him immediately depart the field to seek treatment in a dressing room where T20 batsman Chris Lynn was already sitting with his left arm in a sling.

Courtesy of a mishap during fielding training for members of the T20 squad that was conducted prior to today's ODI getting underway.

Lynn has a history of shoulder problems and this latest issue - a dislocation of the left shoulder - could scarcely have come at a more inopportune time for the destructive Queenslander. 

Finch too, will be out of action with a broken finger, meaning Wade and Khawaja have been added to the T20I squad for this week's two fixtures.

Perera was unable to make Australia pay further for Finch's miss, adding just six to his tally before he also fell to Head.

Although that breakthrough owed more to good fortune than intuitive captaincy given that Perera's rush to review the lbw call and the accompanying video evidence indicated an inside edge, a submission that ultimately failed to persuade third umpire Michael Gough who believed it was out.

Amidst the free-fall of Sri Lanka losing 9-122 in less than 30 overs after such a bright start, John Hastings claimed another merit badge by becoming the leader wicket-taker in ODI cricket for 2016 to date.

Despite missing the best part of four months due to ankle surgery, Hastings' dismissal of Sri Lankan batting prodigy Kusal Mendis for 33 gave him 22 ODI wickets from 10 matches thus far in the calendar year.

It lifted him past South African leg-spinner Imran Tahir with the 2016 title likely to be decided by the rival pair's performances in the five-match ODI series between Australia and the Proteas in South Africa starting later this month.

Where the world's number one ODI team will be challenged in vastly different conditions.