Angelo Mathews bemoans Sri Lanka's lack of Test cricket: "Five feels like not enough"

Sri Lanka are only due to play five Tests in 2023, with two Tests in New Zealand, one Test at home against Ireland, a two-Test series in Pakistan. By contrast, they are scheduled to play 11 ODIs, six T20Is, the Asia Cup and the Cricket World Cup

Angelo Mathews is unhappy with the amount of Test cricket Sri Lanka are scheduled to play in 2023.

Sri Lanka are only due to play five Test matches this year, with two Tests in New Zealand, one Test at home against Ireland - a side not involved in the World Test Championship - and two Tests in Pakistan.

By contrast, their white-ball schedule is full, with 11 ODIs, six T20Is, the Asia Cup and the Cricket World Cup locked in for the remainder of the year. 

However, they can still qualify for the 2023 World Test Championship final at the Oval provided they defeat New Zealand 2-0 in their ongoing series and Australia avoid defeat to India in the final match of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy.

^{Sri Lanka are currently playing against New Zealand in Christchurch [Joe Allison/Getty Images]}

Mathews said: "[It's] unfortunate that we are not playing too many Test matches this year – it's as few as five. We are coming off a long layoff, the last Test was six months back.

"Everyone's talking about Test cricket dying, but we're not doing any good for Test cricket playing only five Tests a year. Hopefully, we'll get more matches this year. Five feels like not enough."

The World Test Championship table perfectly illustrates the inequal distribution of red-ball internationals. England, for example, have played 22 matches during the 2020-23 cycle while Sri Lanka have only played 10.

The majority of series which count towards the Championship are only two matches. However, the big three - Australia, England and India - frequently play four or five match series against one another.

West Indies international Jason Holder recently expressed his grievance with the lack of Test cricket for nations outside the big three, commenting: "The way world cricket is going now, apart from the big three, every team is barely even playing Test cricket."