LEEDS: After winning in South Africa last winter, England’s Test team can show how much progress they have made in the three-match home series against Sri Lanka which starts from Thursday at Headingley.

England’s achievement in knocking South Africa off the top of the Test rankings at the beginning of the year makes it obvious that Alastair Cook’s men are favoured to win against the touring Sri Lankans.

Compared to England’s eye-catching victory in South Africa, Sri Lanka have lost four of their last five series and go into the opening Test without injured seamer Dhammika Prasad, a hero for the Sri Lankans the last time they toured England.

England have a major absence of its own: It’ll be their first Test since batsman James Taylor’s shock retirement from all cricket because of a heart condition.

James Vince has been included to replace Taylor in the middle order and makes his debut in the series opener, but other than that enforced change, England are ready to start the series with the bulk of the team that outplayed the then top-ranked South Africa.

The talk in South Africa during that series was that this England unit — with Ashes and South African series wins in the bag — is ready to make its own run for the No 1 ranking. They start against the Sri Lankans, although they can call on the memories of a surprise and thrilling series win the last time they were in England in 2014.

That contest was won on the second-to-last ball of the final Test, also at Headingley.

“There is a bit of revenge to be had,” England fast bowler Stuart Broad. He also pointed out that the current England team was missing only series wins against Sri Lanka and Pakistan, England’s two opponents over the summer.

“It’s a great motivation for us as a team that we have seven out of nine Test trophies, but Sri Lanka and Pakistan are the two we don’t have,” Broad said.

For Sri Lanka, there’s no Kumar Sangakkara and Mahela Jayawardene, with the two batsmen who so often carried their team’s fortunes retired.

Prasad, who bowled Sri Lanka to their historic first series victory in England in 2014, is also missing for at least the first Test with a shoulder problem.

But Angelo Mathews captains a team that still has plenty of survivors of that Headingley moment.

“We did well here. We were thrilled with that, but this is a new series,” opener Kaushal Silva said. “We have to start all over again. It’ll be tough, but we are looking forward to that challenge.”

Still, against Sri Lanka’s new-look team, England have the advantage of experience and balance.

Batsman Joe Root is in a rich vein of form, there’s a proven fast bowling attack of Broad, James Anderson, and Steven Finn, and all-rounders Ben Stokes and Moeen Ali give captain Cook the luxury of backup options.

Finn beat the uncapped Jake Ball for the final place in England’s XI for the series opener.

In a sign of his quality, Cook is 36 runs short of becoming the first Englishman, and 12th player ever, to reach 10,000 Test runs.

“I hope it comes sooner rather than later so we can talk about something else,” Cook said. “I’ve just got to put that to bed ... and try and do what I’ve done in the previous 10 years, which is just try and concentrate on that ball coming down.”

That adds to England’s expectations that they will take good memories away from Headingley this time.

With England having selected just a 12-man squad, Cook took the unusual step of effectively naming his side 24 hours before the start of a match.

“Steven Finn is going to play,” Cook said. “He’s been outstanding when he’s been fit for us. I think everyone kind of knew that.”

Finn missed the World Twenty20 in India earlier because of calf and side injuries and his Test career has been interrupted by fitness problems.

But his record of 113 Test wickets at an average of just over 28 apiece saw him chosen ahead of Ball in the race to be England’s third seamer behind Anderson and Broad.

Ball has made a strong start to the county season with Nottinghamshire and Cook said: “It was great to have Jake along and he’s made a big impact this year in county cricket.

“It’s great for the guys who haven’t really seen much of him to get to know the guy and he can certainly bowl.”

Sri Lanka, despite heavy odds against them this time, will be pleased to learn that England have a poor recent record at Headingley, with just one win and four defeats at the ground since 2007.

Teams:

ENGLAND: Alastair Cook (captain), Alex Hales, Nick Compton, Joe Root, James Vince, Ben Stokes, Jonny Bairstow, Moeen Ali, Stuart Broad, Steven Finn, James Anderson.

SRI LANKA (from): Angelo Mathews (captain), Dinesh Chandimal, Dhananjaya Silva, Dasun Shanaka, Dilruwan Perera, Dimuth Karunaratne, Dushmantha Chameera, Kaushal Silva, Kusal Mendis, Lahiru Thirimanne, Milinda Siriwardana, Niroshan Dickwella, Nuwan Pradeep, Rangana Herath, Shaminda Eranga, Suranga Lakmal.

Umpires: Aleem Dar (Pakistan) and Rod Tucker (Australia).

TV umpire: Sundaram Ravi (India).

Match referee: Andy Pycroft (Zimbabwe).

Published in Dawn, May 19th, 2016