Mark Butcher said England's fallibility against spin on day two of the first Test was "shameful".
Batsman must up their game against spin, say Butch and Bob
England's fallibility against spin on day two of the opening Test in Sri Lanka was "shameful", according to Mark Butcher.
The tourists, replying to Sri Lanka's 318, were bowled out for just 193 to concede a first-innings deficit of 125 runs as slow left-armer Rangana Herath took 6-74.
England did fight back before stumps as Graeme Swann's 4-28 helped to reduce the hosts to 84-5 but Sri Lanka will start day three 209 runs ahead and Butcher fears the worst for Andrew Strauss' side.
"Before the Test match started, the talk was that in conditions where the ball turned England were better equipped in terms of wicket-taking spin bowlers than Sri Lanka," Butcher told
Sky Sports. "That would never be the case in the days of [Muttiah] Muralitharan, but he's gone.
"Herath is a very honest, left-arm spin bowler. He's only a short guy so he's going to toss the ball up and look to deceive batsmen in the flight.
"England have allowed a guy who bowled a couple of pretty decent deliveries that turned - but other than that he was just bowling regular honest left-arm spin - to bowl them out in less than 50 overs. On this surface, that's shameful really.
"It's a real problem for England, because it is going to get harder for England in the second innings. If they played him that badly when it wasn't turning very much at all, imagine what could happen in the fourth innings of the match."
Merit
England have scored 1,337 runs with the bat in their last seven innings at an average of 191 against Sri Lanka and Pakistan - well below the tally they notched in the previous seven innings, when they scored 3,186 runs at an average of 455 per innings.
Sky Sports expert Bob Willis demanded that England's batsmen address that downturn in form.
"With Sri Lanka already 200-plus in front, how are England with these current techniques and approaches going to chase that down in the fourth innings?
"They are going to have to have a real think-tank about what they are going to do; they've tried the defensive mode in the Emirates, they've tried the attacking mode in the first innings here. Neither have worked.
"You've got to go out and play the ball on its merit; not just go out with a pre-destined plan about how you are going to play today.
"Before the Emirates tour, this side had a great reputation for bouncing back in all sorts of adversity but it would appear that sub-continental conditions are a complete anathema to England's batsmen - they simply can't play there.
"They've got to improve 100 per cent to call themselves the best side in the world; if you can't bat in the sub-continent, you can't be World No 1 for very long.
"So England have got to adopt a different approach; batsmen have got to play themselves in and then be aggressive. The top seven in the order have got to work out a technique for surviving.
"We've said that Herath doesn't look anything particularly special but we said the same about Abdur Rehman, who out-bowled Saeed Ajmal in one of the Test matches in the Emirates. So it is spin bowling on these slow, turning pitches that is the problem for the visiting side."
