Joe Root could scarcely have wished for a better start to England’s epic year of 17 Test matches, walking off the field at stumps on day one in Galle with the runs next to his name matching the 66 on his back and his side a mere whisker from parity.

It followed a remarkably callow collapse by a Sri Lanka team who we were told wanted revenge for the 3-0 defeat to England in 2018. They were rolled for 135 in just 46.1 overs, as a cascade of poor shots and freakish dismissals gifted Dom Bess a second Test five-wicket haul that even he himself accepted was fortuitous.

Stuart Broad picked off three of his own, and with Root and Jonny Bairstow then combining for a bright unbroken stand of 110 – the latter three short of a half-century on his return to the side following a year-long absence – England closed on 127 for two and in a position of dominance.

Sri Lanka’s performance has set alarm bells ringing. They may have lost their captain, Dimuth Karunaratne, before the start – he opted against risking a fractured thumb sustained during the recent 2-0 defeat in South Africa – but neither this nor the bubble life both sides must endure could excuse what followed.

Judging by the sheer exasperation on the face of Mickey Arthur, their typically expressive head coach, an inquest has probably already taken place. Sri Lanka were banking on home conditions and weakened opposition but instead allowed a sparky yet green off-spinner to run through them for the lowest score by a team batting first at Galle, a ground once considered their fortress.

On another day it might have been Broad leading England off the field in the afternoon following this particular slice of history. Having received the nod ahead of Jimmy Anderson as the pair rotate for one spot this winter, the 34-year-old picked up his best figures in Sri Lanka of three for 20 and with it doubled his tally of wickets on the island in what is his third tour.

Broad’s glowing form has been about making the batsmen play more often. Here he zoned in on the stumps and mixed up his speeds in a five-over opening spell that left him visibly blowing from the draining heat, but with the wickets of Lahiru Thirimanne and Kusal Mendis to show for it.

Smart captaincy and a soft shot accounted for Thirimanne, clipping one straight to Bairstow at leg gully, before Broad inflicted the dreaded “Audi” on Mendis two deliveries later – the right-hander’s fourth successive duck in Test cricket – by rolling his fingers over the ball for a leg-cutter that found the edge.

Root used his resources well. Sam Curran kept it tight with the new ball, while Mark Wood topped 90mph and peppered the fit-again Angelo Mathews, even breaking one of his bats in the process. But how England fare during this six-Test winter will chiefly hinge on the spin of Bess and Jack Leach – not that their final rewards here necessarily reflected how well they bowled.

This is their first Test match in tandem and Leach was the far greater threat, overcoming an early missed catch in the deep and settling into a groove in his first England appearance in more than a year. But much like his time out through illness, luck was not necessarily on his side, most notably so when the debutant Dan Lawrence grassed Dinesh Chandimal at cover before lunch.

Leach did eventually get the stand-in skipper caught in the same position for a top score of 28 – this strike following Mathews edging Broad to slip on 27 after the restart – yet Bess was somehow the spinner with the golden arm, despite struggling to control his length. It began in the morning when the opener Kusal Perera gloved Bess’s second ball to slip playing a bizarre reverse sweep and then continued into the afternoon as wicketkeeper Niroshan Dickwella slashed a rank long hop to point.

Beyond Chandimal and Mathews, who boast 10,000-plus Test runs between the all-rounder Dasun Shanaka appeared the most solid. Yet even he must have been left wondering whether he had passed a black cat en route to the ground as a sweep off Bess was inadvertently backheeled by Bairstow at short leg into the gloves of Jos Buttler.

Bess could at least take pride in the delivery that deceived Dilruwan Perera through the air for a sweet clean-bowled. After Lasith Embuldeniya was run out at the non-striker’s end via Leach’s fingertips, the collapse of seven for 54 was completed – and rather summed up – when Wanindu Hasaranga reverse swept at fresh air and gifted Bess his fifth.

Embuldeniya, a left-arm spinner with a casual approach but who gets good revs on the ball through his large hands, did puncture two early holes in England’s lineup, teasing an edge off Dom Sibley for four and persuading Zak Crawley to loft a checked drive to mid-off on nine. But with Root and Bairstow holding firm against Sri Lanka’s three-pronged spin attack and using the sweep shot to good effect – the former also successfully overturned an lbw on 20 – the tourists had taken full control by the end of a rather galling day for their hosts.