Introduction
England and Sri Lanka have met 50 times in ODI cricket with England winning 26 matches and Sri Lanka 24.
They have met twice in the ICC Champions Trophy with England winning both meetings. It won by 49 runs via the Duckworth / Lewis Method at Southampton in 2004 and by six wickets at Johannesburg in 2009.
Sri Lanka was joint-winner in 2002. England has never won the tournament.
Lie of the Land
England has played 38 ODIs at The Oval, winning 22 and losing 15 with one no-result. Sri Lanka has played six games at the venue, with two wins and four defeats.
Six day/night ODIs have been played at the ground. Four have been won batting first and two batting second.
In those six matches, two captains won the toss and chose to bat and four chose to bowl.
The average first innings score is 244.
Recent ODI form
England has played 12 ODIs so far in 2013, winning six and losing six. It beat Australia by 48 runs at Edgbaston in its first match, having lost its recent ODI series to New Zealand 2-1.
Sri Lanka has played nine ODIs in 2013, winning three and losing four with two no-results. It lost to New Zealand by one wicket at Cardiff first time out, having lost to India by five wickets at Birmingham and to the West Indies by 17 runs at the same venue in its warm-up matches.
Upcoming milestones
Ravi Bopara needs 27 runs to reach 2000 in ODI cricket.
Tillakaratne Dilshan needs two catches to reach 100 in ODI cricket.
Nuwan Kulasekara needs two wickets to reach 150 in ODI cricket.
Reliance ICC Rankings News
Victory for England would put it second in the Reliance ICC One-Day International Championship. Lose and it could fall to fourth. No matter what the result, Sri Lanka will remain in fifth place.
Jonathan Trott is England’s highest-rated batsman in fifth place. In his last nine matches he has not made less than 37 – a run equalling Javed Miandad’s record set back in 1987.
Alastair Cook is not far behind him at number eight. As captain he averages 44.00 with a strike rate of 83. Merely in the ranks he averaged 30.52 with a strike rate of just 68. Ian Bell’s successive scores of 82 and 91 have lifted him to 16th.
Steven Finn sits in third place among the bowlers, with James Anderson at number seven thanks to 21 wickets at 16.52 in his last nine matches. Graeme Swann has struggled since the start of 2012, with just 13 wickets at 42.23 in 14 matches.
Kumar Sangakkara and Tillakaratne Dilshan are both in the top ten with the bat. Sangakkara scored 68 against New Zealand and averages 59.50 in his last 13 ODIs. Dilshan has three centuries and two fifties in his last ten matches.
Mahela Jayawardena boasts 15 ODI centuries but has failed to convert any of his last 12 fifties into a three-figure score.
Lasith Malinga uniquely has taken three ODI hat-tricks. He is currently ranked 9th thanks to 17 wickets at 14.23 in his last eight matches, including 4-34 against New Zealand.
Captain Angelo Mathews’s proficiency with both disciplines has seen him break into the world’s top five all-rounders, with Dilshan just one place behind him.