After the retirement of Chaminda Vaas, Muttiah Muralitharan, Mahela Jayawardene and Kumar Sangakkara Sri Lankan cricket team seemed an ordinary side which doesn’t have the ability to beat any top team.

Just two months back Sri Lanka lost to England in both Tests as well as in the One-day International (ODI) series (3-0).

Number one Test side Australia started the Test series as favourites. Angelo Mathews won the toss and chose to bat in the first Test at Pallekele. The home side was bowled out for 117. But the visitors were shocked by a relatively young and inexperienced Sri Lankan team which won the Test by 106 runs.

In the second Test, the hosts proved that their first Test win was not a fluke. Sri Lanka crushed Australia by 229 runs in the second Test in Galle to take an unassailable 2-0 lead in the three-Test series and win the Warne-Muralitharan Trophy for the first time since its inception in 2007-08.

Before this Sri Lanka had won a Test series against Australia only once, in 1999, also at home.

Over the last four years, every team except Zimbabwe has won a Test in Asia. But Australia haven’t. Second Test defeat against Sri Lanka was the eighth consecutive loss for Australia in Tests on Asian soil -- the second-longest losing sequence for an overseas team in Asia after West Indies’ ten consecutive losses from 1997 to 2002. Australia’s last win in Asia came against Sri Lanka in 2011.

England (7), New Zealand (9) and South Africa (10) have all played a similar number of matches in Asia over the past four years and have each managed to pull off two victories and not lose more than four matches. Australia played 19 matches, won three (including a 2-0 series win in Bangladesh in 2006), lost 11 Tests, while four ended in draw.

It was the third consecutive series losses for Australia in Asia. Before this, they had lost 0-2 to Pakistan in the UAE in 2014-15 and 0-4 to India in 2012-13. This loss against Sri Lanka is their fifth in the last six series in Asia.

Since 2013, the average Australian Test innings total in Asia has been 236 while it’s been 332 outside Asia. In this period, Australia have been bowled out seven times for less than 200 runs in Test cricket. Four of these occasions have been in Asia. They have never been bowled out below 200 at home.

Despite all their batting capacity, the Aussies fail to justify their talent when they play in Asia. Since 2013, Australian batsmen have averaged 51.66 at home and 43.07 anywhere outside Asia, but in Asia, their average is just 22.42.

Australia’s 106 runs in the first innings of the second Test was their lowest score in 28 Tests against Sri Lanka. For the first time in 19 years no Australian batsman managed a fifty in a Test match.

Chasing a mammoth total of 413, Australia slipped to 80-5. It was only the second time since 2000 that Australia had lost half their side before 100 runs in both innings of a Test; they were 92-5 and 82-5 against England at Trent Bridge in 2015.

Disappointed Australian captain Steve Smith accepted that they had a lot of work to do to win in the subcontinent.

Sri Lankan off-spinner Dilruwan Perera finished with match winning figures of 10-99. In his 11th Test, Perera became the fastest Sri Lankan bowler to take 50 Test wickets, beating Ajantha Mendis who took 12 matches to reach the milestone.

Australia may also lose their top position in the ICC Test ranking if they lost the third Test against Sri Lanka and England won the Test series against Pakistan by 3-1 and India don’t beat West Indies by 1 margin of 3-0. But India can grab the top spot if they win the series in the West Indies by 3-0 as the tourists lead the best-of-four series 1-0 after two Tests.