Leeds Thriller Reveals Much About Test Cricket's Charm

An assortment of factors, Paulo Coelho would happily note, conspired to bring the most gripping of final days to a most dramatic and nerve-shredding conclusion at Headingley on Tuesday.

When the fifth day started, with England 57 for 5 needing 350 runs to win or six sessions to bat out a draw, it seemed Sri Lanka were assured of victory. But ball by ball, over by over, hour by hour, session by session, they were left dumbfounded and frustrated by Moeen Ali's monumental efforts, with England's No 11 James Anderson piling on the agony with a 55-ball 0 that ended one delivery short of the stipulated overs required to be bowled. It was that awesome, that engaging, that rewarding, that cruel and that beautiful.

The first wicket of the day fell at a score of 124, as Joe Root's resistance was snapped by Nuwan Pradeep in the 57th over. In the 72nd over, Dhammika Prasad achieved his first five-wicket haul in Tests when he had Matt Prior caught at short leg when fending a short ball. Sri Lanka's celebrations were put on hold as Billy Bowden asked third umpire Paul Reiffel to check for a no-ball on a desperately close call. The result went in Sri Lanka's favour and Prasad, 31, had achieved the best figures by a Sri Lankan fast bowler in England.

England were 160 for 7, meaning Sri Lanka needed just three wickets for a famous series victory. They were left waiting as Chris Jordan batted 62 deliveries for his 21; after that, Stuart Broad ate up 24 balls for 0. When he was out to Rangana Herath, England were still 20.2 overs from safety.

Anderson batted 55 balls without scoring a run, until he was the final wicket of the Test to give Sri Lanka the series 1-0. That is just 22 balls short of the record by a No 11 who never opened his account. That took more than guts, and Anderson can take immense satisfaction from his innings.

But you have to feel for Moeen, who was left to stare on blankly as Anderson fended a short delivery from Shaminda Eranga to backward square leg. Two balls was all that separated Moeen from getting solid applause and a place in Test cricket's pantheon of great match-saving efforts. Make no mistake, this was an insanely determined, stubborn and remorseless innings from a man in his second Test, and who had been unfairly singled out by one English journalist earlier this month for wearing his faith on his chin.

To bat 281 balls in any situation is a test of a player's skill and endurance. To do so in the final innings of a Test match, with defeat looming large, and bat out an entire final day's play suggests some sort of zen-like concentration. Since 2000, only Michael Vaughan batted more deliveries in the final innings of a Test match for England. Overall, on only 11 occasions did English batsmen face more deliveries than Moeen's 281 on day five at Leeds in the fourth innings.

While at the same time on a different kind of sporting pitch in Brazil, footballer Luis Suarez displayed something bordering on a personality disorder, at Headingley Moeen was the embodiment about all that is good about an unflappable temperament. Whatever Sri Lanka threw at him, Moeen resisted. He left with assurance and played with a straight bat, keeping out deliveries on the stumps and swaying out of the short stuff. When Sri Lanka's quick bowlers conceived the policy of bowling wide of the left-hander's off stump to tempt him into impetuosity in the gully area, Moeen moved his front foot forward and head well across and resisted. How could you not be sucked in to this tussle?

This is the beauty of Test cricket; that a five-day tussle between two teams can stretch the physical and mental reserves of 22 men. That scripts are written and re-written, plans dashed and predictions squashed.

The result is a draw. On paper, no team won. But those with a fetish for the intricacies and nuances of the five-day game will have been touched by Moeen and Anderson's last-ditch alliance, an emotional journey between two contrasting players that has given us one of Test cricket's greatest rearguards. In this era of Twenty20 cricket, Tuesday's proceedings was one of the most satisfying results in recent years.

These two Tests between England and Sri Lanka have whet the purist's appetite ahead of a marquee five-Test series between England and India starting in a few weeks time at Trent Bridge. If those matches pick up from where England v Sri Lanka has left off, fans of Test cricket are going to be in for a most splendid summer.