Mahela Jayawardene and Sri Lanka enjoy coming up against England teams © Getty Images

Sri Lanka are confident of retaining their proud record against England even without the prolific skills of off-spinner Muttiah Muralitharan in their line-up.

Muralitharan has been ruled out of the first three matches in the five-game series with a bicep injury and is not likely to play, if at all, until the fourth match in Colombo on October 10.

But as they prepare for the start of the series in Dambulla, Sri Lanka believe they have enough strength in depth to remain a threat - even without a player who has claimed 455 one-day international wickets during his stunning career.

“It doesn’t make that big a difference,” claimed captain Mahela Jayawardene. “We’ve done it in the past and our guys are capable of handling different situations.

“Murali is obviously a fantastic bowler to have in your team. He’s a match-winner but we have to change our gameplan to suit what we’ve got.

“We’ve toured without Murali and done well and we played without him for almost a year when he had a shoulder problem - when our guys are pushed to the limit we tend to come back strongly and hopefully that will be the case again.”

Recent history, particularly against England, suggests that Jayawardene does have a point with Sri Lanka claiming a 5-0 whitewash on English soil just over a year ago despite Muralitharan missing the last three matches in that series.

He was present, however, when England last played on this ground and were routed by 10 wickets, a defeat which began a run of just one defeat in the last eight matches for Sri Lanka against this opposition at home and abroad.

Sri Lanka will have to do without the talents of Muttiah Muralitharan © Getty Images

Murali’s most likely replacement is 25-year-old leg-spinning all-rounder Kausal Lokuarachchi, who Sri Lanka have high hopes for despite him playing only 19 one-day internationals since his debut five years ago.

“We’re looking ahead at different combinations and he’s played some good cricket,” enthused Jayawardene.

“He’s been around the set-up for a while but he did not settle in straight away so he’s played a lot of domestic and A team cricket, but now in the last six months he’s been very consistent.

“He fits in nicely so we thought we’d give him a go. He does turn it a bit, but he can be a bit deceptive as well because he’s got a few variations up his sleeve.

“He’s well suited to the one-day game because he’s very good with the bat and in the field - he’s a pretty decent all-rounder.”

He is likely to be a straight replacement for Murali and with Tillakaratne Dilshan and Sanath Jayasuriya also providing spin alternatives alongside trusted seamers like Chaminda Vaas, Lasith Malinga and Dilhara Fernando, Sri Lanka are expected to triumph over England’s inexperienced line-up.

“We’d like to maintain that (good record) but we have to do all the right things - it won’t just happen,” warned Jayawardene.

“From ball one we have to work hard, stick to our gameplan and execute it. It won’t just happen just because we have a good record against them.”