Sri Lanka's captain Mahela Jayawardene won the toss and elected to bat in the first cricket Test against England at the Asgiriya stadium on Saturday.
England awarded a Test cap to Ravi Bopara, preferring the 22-year-old Essex all-rounder to Owais Shah for the number six
spot left vacant by the injured Andrew Flintoff.
The tourists also left out Steve Harmison to pick a three-man seam attack in Matthew Hoggard, James Anderson and Ryan Sidebottom, with a lone specialist spinner, Monty Panesar.
Sri Lanka also chose three seamers, leaving out leg-spinner Malinga Bandara to play Dilhara Fernando.
Sri Lankan seamer Chaminda Vaas makes his 100th Test appearance while off-spinner Muttiah Muralitharan is five wickets away from surpassing Australian Shane Warne's world record tally of 708 wickets.
Teams
England: Michael Vaughan (capt), Alastair Cook, Ian Bell, Kevin Pietersen, Paul Collingwood, Ravi Bopara, Matthew Prior (wicket-keeper), James Anderson, Matthew Hoggard, Ryan Sidebottom, Monty Panesar.
Sri Lanka: Mahela Jayawardene (captain), Kumar Sangakkara, Sanath Jayasuriya, Michael Vandort, Chamara Silva, Jehan Mubarak, Prasanna Jayawardene (wicket-keeper), Chaminda Vaas, Lasith Malinga, Dilhara Fernando, Muttiah Muralitharan.
Umpires: Alem Dar (PAK) and Asad Rauf (PAK)
TV umpire: Tyron Wijewardene (SRI)
Match referee: Jeff Crowe (NZL).
Sri Lanka bat first against England
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