Kamindu Mendis has accomplished something in Test cricket that no other batter has done before. The final Test match of the two-match series between Sri Lanka and New Zealand is taking place in Galle.
By the end of the first day, Sri Lanka had scored 306 runs for the loss of three wickets in 90 overs, with Angelo Mathews on 78 and Kamindu Mendis on 51 not out. As soon as Mendis reached his half-century, he set a remarkable world record.
From his debut Test match until now, Mendis has scored 50 or more runs in eight consecutive Test matches, breaking the previous record held by Pakistan’s Saud Shakeel.
Shakeel had achieved this feat in seven consecutive Test matches starting from his debut. Mendis matched Shakeel’s record in the first Test of the series, but Shakeel did not manage to score a fifty in his eighth Test. Given Mendis’s performance since his debut, he is being hailed as the future star of Sri Lankan cricket.