Warne–Muralitharan Trophy
The Warne–Muralitharan Trophy is awarded to the winner of the Australia–Sri Lanka Test cricket series from 2007–08 season onwards. The trophy is named after the two leading wicket takers in Test cricket, Sri Lanka's Muttiah Muralitharan and Australia's Shane Warne. The trophy celebrates the 25th anniversary of Australia–Sri Lanka Test cricket. The trophy features casts of the two bowlers' right hands and match-used cricket balls bowled by them during their careers. Sri Lanka Cricket, the governing body of cricket in Sri Lanka had written to its Australian counterpart, Cricket Australia, that the winner of the series should be awarded a trophy named after the two bowlers. Cricket Australia had responded positively to the Sri Lankans' proposal. In unveiling the trophy, Cricket Australia said in a statement,
The Warne–Muralidaran trophy became the latest addition to the series of trophies named after former players such as the Border-Gavaskar Trophy, for Test series between Australia and India and the Chappell–Hadlee Trophy which is contested between Australia and New Zealand in ODI format.
History
Background
Before the Warne–Muralidaran Trophy,, Australia and Sri Lanka had played each other 18 times in the 21-year period, there had been four tours each in each country. Out of the 18 tests Australia had won 11 times while Sri Lanka had won only once, in 1999, and 6 Tests had been drawn. The following were all regular, not Warne-Muralidaran Tests between the two countries:| Season | Host | Tests | Australia | Sri Lanka | Drawn | Result |
| 1982–83 | Australia | |||||
| 1987–88 | Australia | |||||
| 1989–90 | Australia | |||||
| 1992 | Australia | |||||
| 1995–96 | Australia | |||||
| 1999 | Sri Lanka | |||||
| 2003–04 | Australia | |||||
| 2004 | Australia |
Inaugural series
retired from cricket in 2007 with 708 wickets against his name and Muttiah Muralitharan played the 2007–2008 series eight wickets short of Warne's tally at the start of the series. Ricky Ponting stated that he was determined to deny Murali from getting the nine wickets required to surpass Warne as the highest wicket taker in Test cricket while in Australia. At the end of the series Muralitharan had bagged only four wickets. Australia won the test series and the trophy 2–0. In the second Test, Kumar Sangakkara was given out when the ball actually hit his shoulder on 192 by umpire Rudi Koertzen. After the match Koertzen apologised to Sangakkara. During the series Marvan Atapattu, former Sri Lankan cricket captain criticised the selecting board of Sri Lanka Cricket saying the selectors were a group of "Muppets headed by a joker" referring to chairman of selectors, Ashantha de Mel. Atapattu retired from cricket at the end of the series.2011 series
On the second day of the first Test, Nathan Lyon took his first wicket in tests with his first ball, his victim was Kumar Sangakkara; he is the 14th international player and 2nd Australian to do so. He finished with figures of 5/34, becoming the 131st player to take five wickets on debut in a Test match. Also, Trent Copeland took his first wicket in tests with his second ball; his victim was Tillakaratne Dilshan. Also in the first test the ICC admitted that the hawk-eye or eagle-eye made an error.On the first day of the third Test Shaminda Eranga got his first wicket in Tests with his first ball ; his victim was Shane Watson. Also on the first day Shaun Marsh achieved an average of 209, the highest ever by an Australian. Michael Hussey was Man of the Match for all three test matches and was also awarded Man of the Series.
2012–13 series
Australia completed a clean-sweep of the series, winning 3–0.2016 series
Sri Lanka had a poor run leading up to this series, where they lost across all forms in England. The first match was at Pallekele was memorable one for Kusal Mendis who scored his maiden test century and bowling of Rangana Herath lead Sri Lanka to a 106 run victory, their first test victory over the visitors in 17 years. The win boosted the confidence of the home team leading to the second test in Galle. Performances by Herath and Dilruwan Perera sealed the series with a 229 run victory. The spin duo took 18 wickets out of the possible 20 in the game. Third test was at SSC, Dinesh Chandimal and Dhananjaya de Silva scored centuries in the first innings. In reply, Shaun Marsh and Steven Smith score centuries for the visitors. In the third and crucial innings, Kaushal Silva a scored a century giving setting a target over 300 to Aussies. In the final day the Australians started to crumble, only David Warner scored half century and no other batsman score more than 30. Herath took 13 wickets in the match and Sri Lanka managed to win by 163 runs, whitewashing Australia for the first time in their history. Herath won both Man of the match award and Player of the Series awards. With this win Sri Lanka moved above South Africa in Test rankings, and Australia lost the top spot on the rankings.2018–19 series
Australia completed a clean-sweep of the series, winning 2–0.List of Warne–Muralitharan Trophy series
| Series | Season | Played in | First match | Tests played | Tests won by Australia | Tests won by Sri Lanka | Tests drawn | Player of the Series | Series result | Holder at series end |
| 1 | 2007–08 | Australia | 8 November 2007 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 0 |  Brett Lee | Australia | Australia |
| 2 | 2011 | Sri Lanka | 31 August 2011 | 3 | 1 | 0 | 2 | Michael Hussey | Australia | Australia |
| 3 | 2012–13 | Australia | 14 December 2012 | 3 | 3 | 0 | 0 | Michael Clarke | Australia | Australia |
| 4 | 2016 | Sri Lanka | 26 July 2016 | 3 | 0 | 3 | 0 |  Rangana Herath | Sri Lanka | Sri Lanka |
| 5 | 2018–19 | Australia | 24 January 2019 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 0 | Pat Cummins | Australia | Australia |
| Australian Test wins | Sri Lankan Test wins | Draws |
| 8 | 3 | 2 |
Timeline
ImageSize = width:650 height:80 PlotArea = width:600 height:30 left:20 bottom:50 TimeAxis = orientation:horizontal DateFormat = yyyy Period = from:2005 till:2025 AlignBars = early ScaleMajor = unit:year increment:5 start:2005 ScaleMinor = unit:year increment:1 start:2005 Legend = left:20 top:20 columnwidth:240 Colors =
id:AUSD value:rgb legend:Drawn,_retained_by_Australia id:SRI value:blue legend:Sri_Lanka id:SRID value:rgb legend:Drawn,_retained_by_Sri_Lanka id:canvas value:rgb Backgroundcolors = canvas:canvas PlotData = color:AUS from:2007 till:2011 color:AUS from:2011 till:2013 color:AUS from:2013 till:2016 color:SRI from:2016 till:2019 color:AUS from:2019 till:2022 |