Associated Press

Wellington, April 10:

New Zealand will work on strategies to overcome Sri Lanka’s unorthodox fast-bowling discovery Lasith Malinga in the second Test which starts on Monday at the Basin Reserve.

Malinga took eight wickets in the drawn first Test at Napier and came close on the final day to bowling Sri Lanka to a win in a match played on a hard, flat batting pitch.

His unconventional, round-arm action caused problems for the New Zealand

batsmen who struggled to pick his length from his unusual release point at only

shoulder height.

Twice in the first test New Zealand batsmen asked umpires Steve Bucknor and Darrell Hair to change or remove items of clothing because the ball, delivered with an almost horizontal arm, became invisible against a dark background.

Both umpires removed their burgundy ties in the first innings and Bucknor was forced to cover his dark trousers in the second to provide the batsman with a lighter backdrop from which to see the ball.

“We just consistently can’t see him,” New Zealand captain Stephen Fleming said after the Napier Test. “Out of the hand you see it from the umpire’s shirt and then you lose it in the trousers.”