Worcestershire 2023 signing, Michael Bracewell, picked up three wickets, including top scorer Dimuth Karunaratne, as New Zealand forced Sri Lanka to follow-on on day three of the Second Test in Wellington.
Bracewell, who will play for the Rapids in the Vitality Blast this summer, also broke the only significant stand of Sri Lanka’s first innings as they were bowled out for 164, a massive 416 in arrears on first innings.
The off spinner extracted extra turn and bounce and finished with figures of 3-50 from 12 overs.
Bracewell had not been required to bat as the Black Caps amassed 580-4 in their first innings and then reduced Sri Lanka to 34-4.
Resistance came from Karunaratne and Dinesh Chandimal, who added 80 for the fifth wicket, before Bracewell struck in successive overs.
Chandimal (37) came down the wicket but was defeated by a delivery which turned sharply between bat and pad and was stumped by Tom Blundell.
Bracewell then accounted for Dhananjaya de Silva (0) who picked out New Zealand captain, Tim Southee, at short mid wicket.
Karunaratne continued to battle away but he started to run out of partners and on 89 was ninth out when he tried to hit Bracewell over the top and was caught at long off by Tom Latham.
Bracewell bowled 10 tidy overs for 28 runs when Sri Lanka followed on and reached 113-2 from 43 overs by the close, still 303 runs in arrears