Galle, Sri Lanka, Jun 29 (AP) Australian spin bowlers Mitchell Swepson and Nathan Lyon took two wickets each to restrict Sri Lanka to 191-6 at tea Wednesday on the opening day of the first cricket test.

Niroshan Dickwella hit his 21st test half-century and was batting on 51 with No. 8 Ramesh Mendis on 22. The pair has added 52 runs for the seventh wicket, in trying to rebuild Sri Lanka's innings.

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Sri Lanka opted to bat first after winning the toss and resumed its innings after lunch at 68-2.

Lyon struck with only six more runs added to the lunch score to dismiss Sri Lankan captain Dimuth Karunaratne (28).

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A delivery from Lyon that did not turn as expected took an inside edge off Karunaratne's bat, hit his pad for a fine diving catch for David Warner at silly-point.

Swepson took two consecutive wickets in the 37th over with identical deliveries. The leg spinner got the first delivery of the over drifting toward right-handed Dananjaya de Silva's leg stump and the bouncing ball took a fine outside edge for a catch to wicketkeeper Alex Carey.

De Silva made 14.

Dinesh Chandimal was dismissed first ball when the ball turned, bounced and rebounded to Warner at second slip from wicketkeeper Carey's glove.

Angelo Mathews (39) tried to work a bouncing delivery from Lyon on leg stump for Warner's third catch, this time at leg-slip.

Mathews' dismissal left Sri Lanka 139-6 before Dickwella and Mendis started rebuilding the innings. Dickwella faced 46 balls and hit five fours.

Swepson had bowling figures of 2-51 while Lyon returned 2-80.

Earlier Sri Lanka captain Karunaratne and Pathum Nissanka opened the batting and added 38 runs for the first wicket.

Fast bowler Pat Cummins forced an edge off Nissanka (23) with a rising delivery to wicketkeeper Carey and four runs later Starc had No. 3 batsman Kusal Mendis (3) driving far from his body for an edge to Carey.

The home team named three-spin bowlers for the match, including leg spinner Jeffrey Vandersay for his test debut. The 32-year-old has taken 25 wickets in 19 one-day internationals and seven wickets in 14 Twenty20 internationals for Sri Lanka.

Left-arm spinner Lasith Embuldeniya and offspinner Mendis, along with Vandersay, will add variety to the spin attack.

Asitha Fernando will be the sole seam bowler in the team with the option of calling up allrounder Mathews to bowl a few overs of seam if needed.

Lyon, with 427 wickets in 108 matches, leads the Australian spin attack with Swepson supporting him.

The series is being played for the Warne-Muralitharan Trophy, named after the two top bowlers in test history with 1,508 test wickets combined. This is the first series for the trophy after Australian great Shane Warne died in March from a heart attack while vacationing in Thailand.

A brief remembrance was held for Warne before the match.

The Australian leg spinner — who took 708 test wickets behind Sri Lanka's Muttiah Muralitharan's 800 — took his 500th test wicket at this ground in 2004 and helped rebuild the ground after it was destroyed by the Asian tsunami later that year. AP

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)