Harry Brook insists there were positives to take from England’s performance in their one-day international defeat in Sri Lanka, having seen build-up to their series opener overshadowed by off-field controversies.
Brook admitted pre-match he feels lucky to still be England captain after a nightclub altercation with a bouncer in New Zealand in October, a story that only became public after their 4-1 Ashes thumping against Australia.
England have also dealt with speculation over the future of the team, with head coach Brendon McCullum’s position still in question and continued comments surrounding the ‘drinking culture’ after a mid-Ashes trip to Noosa.
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Harry Brook admits he’s lucky to still be England’s white-ball captain after an altercation with a nightclub bouncer the night before a match
England were undone by Sri Lanka’s spinners to fall to a 19-run defeat in Colombo, as the morale-boosting victory Brook’s men craved slipped away, leaving the tourists 1-0 down in the three-match ODI series.
“Lovely to get back to the day job,” Brook said. “Unfortunately, we lost the game but there’s still a lot of positives to take from today.”
Kusal Mendis’ unbeaten 93 and Dunith Wellalage smashing 25 from 12 balls helped Sri Lanka set a testing target in Colombo, although half-centuries from Joe Root and Ben Duckett appeared to have England well placed in their chase of 272 under lights.
England slipped from 129-1 to 165-6 during a frustrating 12-over spell as Sri Lanka’s spinners took control, with the tourists eventually being dismissed in the final over despite a late 34-run cameo from Jamie Overton.
“With the batting power we have, it only took us to get off to a flyer for us to break the back of that chase,” Brook insisted. “On another day, we knock that off three down. The pitch got a little bit more extreme, the turn and lack of bounce, it was proving very difficult to start as a batter out there.
“Ducky [Ben Duckett] and Rooty [Joe Root] made it look fairly easy when they were set and going but they both came off and said it was hard to start on there, just getting used to the turn, bounce and sometimes the lack of spin when it just skids through.
Ben Duckett top-scored for England with 62 from 76 deliveries
“That’s something we’ve got to look at as a batting unit and hopefully we can take some positives forward into the next couple of games.”
Brook: Sri Lanka deserved the victory
England lost 11 of their 15 50-over matches across 2025, while a series defeat in Sri Lanka would raise the embarrassing prospect of missing out on automatic qualification for the 2027 World Cup.
Sri Lanka can wrap up series victory, with a match to spare, with another win on Saturday at the same venue
“That’s been spoken about a hell of a lot in the last year or so, but we just want to try and be in the moment as much as possible,” Brook admitted. “Sri Lanka have just outperformed us there.”
Brook said about Sri Lanka in the post-match presentation: “It [the toss] was very crucial at the end but Sri Lanka have played a very good game there and deserved to take the victory.
“I thought we bowled really well through the middle – the spinners bowled exceptionally well. Obviously they got hold of us in the last over but that’s part of white-ball cricket.
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Despite overseeing a 4-1 Ashes defeat, Brendon McCullum insisted earlier this month that he would like to remain as England head coach
“They’re a very good side, they’ve got some extremely good spinners as well. They were getting enough out of the surface to be able to get us to miss the ball. They challenged us in lots of different departments and they had a good game.”
England in Sri Lanka – results and fixtures
All times UK and Ireland
First ODI (January 22, Colombo) – Sri Lanka win by 19 runsSecond ODI (Saturday January 24) – Colombo (9am)Third ODI (Tuesday January 27) – Colombo (9am)First T20 (Friday January 30) – Pallekele (1.30pm)Second T20 (Sunday February 1) – Pallekele (1.30pm)Third T20 (Tuesday February 3) – Pallekele (1.30pm)
