Marcus Trescothick poses among a collection of Buddha statues during the 2003 tour © Getty Images

By rights, the Asgiriya Stadium in Kandy ought to be the most tranquil setting for a cricket match anywhere in the world. It's not just the natural beauty of the sight - a delightful, atmospheric park of a ground carved directly out of the neighbouring hill-side - it is the spiritual well-being of the venue as well. A vast white statue of Buddha peers down from the heights above, and the monks of the nearby research institute seem to confer their benign blessings as they sneak glimpses of the action between chores.

And yet, how contrary the experience often turns out to be. England have been to Asgiriya twice before, in 2000-01 and 2003-04, and on each occasion their karmic brownie points have been drained as efficiently as the city's famous Temple of the Tooth is said to top them up. Both matches were coloured by some of the filthiest bouts of temper on a cricket field this decade, all of which is enough to make a monk blush.

The first fixture, in 2000-01, was indisputably the worst. Sanath Jayasuriya was given out caught at slip after hammering the ball into the ground, and hurled his helmet into the boundary boards in frustration. Kumar Sangakkara used his lawyerly logic to get so far under the skin of England's intellectual opener, Mike Atherton, that a bout of irate finger-jabbing ensued. And fines were flung around like confetti by the authoritarian match referee, Hanumant Singh, a man after whom Duncan Fletcher later named his souvenir of the trip - a giant wooden elephant.

The only man who felt any karmic blessings in that game was England's captain, Nasser Hussain. He was in the middle of a shocking run of form, interspersed with some outrageous umpiring decisions, and had managed a solitary fifty in 21 innings since the start of 2000. Now he was twice caught at bat-pad and twice given not out by the less-than-hawk-eyed local umpire, BC Cooray, en route to the century that set England up for a memorable and rancorous win.

But what comes around goes around, and three years later, Hussain was back in the ranks and back in the eye of the storm, after a less-than-civil greeting to Muttiah Muralitharan as he came out to bat in Sri Lanka's first innings. A pair of expletives, and the words "cheat" and "chucker" were widely believed to have been used, and though Hussain escaped without censure after a late-night meeting with the match referee, Clive Lloyd, he was given a sound chastising by the local media, one of whom wrote a leading article warning "Mr Hussain" to "tread lightly and mind your manners".

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Sadly, for all the fun and furores that the Asgiriya has provided since its inaugural Test in 1983, its days as an international venue are strictly numbered. A new, purpose-built stadium has been commissioned at Pallekele, on the eastern outskirts of the town, and despite all the delays, disputes and planning hassles so associated with such constructions, it is expected to be up and running in time for the 2011 World Cup.

The principle problem with the Asgiriya is its ownership. The ground is the private property of Trinity College - whose alumni include Kumar Sangakkara and Ranjan Madugalle, not to mention a host of politicians and businessmen - and though the beauty of the ground is not in question, the revenue potential most certainly is.

The Asgiriya has not got much of a capacity either - there's only one permanent stand, above the players' pavilion, while the best seats in the house are the sole preserve of the Old Trinitians' Sports Club, whose exclusive clubhouse at deep midwicket is only accessible from the road.

Then there's the media facilities. Perfectly adequate for the print media, who delight in their open-fronted whitewashed vantage point, but not quite so ideal for the various TV and radio companies who jostle for cables and soundproofing on the echoing upper deck. Unless they schedule a warm-up for future tours, England will never play here again, and India in 2008 are likely to be the last visitors. It's sad to say farewell, but let's enjoy the venue while it lasts.

	The Sri Lankan Army Band. They still need a bit of practice © Andrew Miller

You get used to strange tooting noises when you're out and about in Colombo. The city is a constant cacophony of klaxons and horns, and if enough of them sound in sequence, it can sometimes seem musical.

It's a little bit more confusing, however, when designated musicians end up sounding like a fleet of frustrated tuk-tuk drivers. For the last two days of England's warm-up, a strangulated brassy din has been wafting across the breeze from the car-park of the SSC, where the Sri Lankan military band have been practising their scales ahead of their gala performance during the second Test.

As their tuba player explained between puffs, the band are being lined up to provide lunchtime entertainment - though on which days he wasn't yet sure - and when all their efforts come together they intend to delight the punters with a medley of old favourites, such as the Sri Lankan national anthem, and Land of Hope and Glory.

Fortunately there's still a fortnight to go before the grand opening night. Goodness knows they need it. Maybe their performance will benefit from being on the big stage, but for the time being, they've chosen to congregate behind the NCC's whitewashed brick sightscreen, which must be rather like trying to produce your best innings on a scratchy coconut-matting net.

They've been out of sight, but most certainly not out of mind. "Are we disturbing you?" asked the band members yesterday morning, as the Sky Sports team lined up their shots of the day's play. "Not at all," came the ever-polite reply. Forty-eight hours of involuntary trumpet later, and several peculiarly soundtracked snippets, they are possibly ruing their stoicism.

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	The scoreboard operator keeps the tally ticking at the NCC © Andrew Miller

As the guidebooks delight in telling you, Sri Lanka is awash with shrines, temples and pagodas. They tower above their surroundings, demanding attention from devotees and passers-by alike, and many of them are not merely beautiful, they remain functional as well.

In fact, they sound rather like the magnificent manual scoreboards that can be found all around the cricket grounds of Cinnamon Gardens. From Aravinda de Silva's nearby school ground to the SSC, these structures dominate their corners of the field, their vivid white-on-black numbering visible even to the blindest old stalwarts in the member's pavilion.

If only all grounds could impart their information in such an attractive and user-friendly manner. The modern trend, especially in England and Australia, is to use electricity all the way. This causes all manner of problems, from power failures to advertising interruptions, to the simple impossibility of working out which number refers to which part of the game.

There's no mistaking what's going on on these boards, however. The home team and individual scores are listed down on side, the visitors down the other; the total score and the not-out batsmen in bold at the top, and the bowling figures and sundry information nestled at the bottom. The boards can be prone to the odd glitch of course - at CCC earlier this week, England were known as "Fleet Street" for most of the first day - but the NCC tally has remained magnificently accurate all match.

It's quite an operation going on behind the facades of these beasts. The official scorers sit down at pitch level, ready to answer queries if required but generally detached from the bedlam above them. A series of cast-iron ladders carry you onwards and upwards to three concrete platforms, each strewn with innumerable metal numbers, and each manned by an incredibly focused tallyman.

	The view from the top of the scoreboard © Andrew Miller

Matthew, Irshad and Ruwan are their names, and each has a specific task to carry out. Irshad is the busiest, for he is in control of the giant wheels that tot up each run as it happens. His eyes never stray from the action, and he's plugged into an ipod, presumably to cut off outside interference.

Matthew patrols the middle level. His job is to update the bowling figures every over - less labour intensive, perhaps, but presumably requiring better mental arithmetic. Ruwan is the sweeper. He kicks back in a plastic chair for most of the day, and is only called upon to update the overs bowled, extras and fall of wickets.

Nevertheless, like the cogs in a clock, they all play a significant and co-ordinated part, and the game we've all been watching is all the richer for their efforts.

	The new pavilion at the NCC © Andrew Miller

I jumped in my tuk-tuk this morning and asked the driver to take me to "Nondescripts Cricket Club", the venue for England's second warm-up match. I might as well have asked him to take me to Grace Road, because he looked decidedly nonplussed. I tried again, a little more phonetically - still no joy, and the clock was ticking. So I changed tack. "NCC?" I enquired. He roared with laughter, pumped his engine into life, and hurtled off at a canter.

Such is the power of the acronym. In England, only one such club could get away with being known by its initials, and even then most taxi-drivers would need you to specify "Lord's" if you wanted to get there. In Colombo, there are three lined up on the same signpost, as you turn off the main thoroughfare and head for the tranquil environs of Cinnamon Gardens.

NCC, CCC and SSC. Three venerable first-class clubs, each a six-hit away from the other, and each with its own unique history. From the air the three clubs form an L-shape as they line up along Maitland Place - CCC on the west side of the road, NCC directly opposite, and SSC one click to the south. As England's game got underway, a certain familiar face could be seen peering like a ticketless fan through the mesh fence that divides the two properties. It was Muttiah Muralitharan, spying on his opponents ahead of a Sri Lankan training session at the Sinhalese Sports Club (to give it its full and less familiar title).

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The great and the good of Sri Lankan cricket were out in force at the NCC today, and not just because England were passing through. At 8.30am, two hours before the start of play, the ground's brand-new pavilion was officially opened by the president of Sri Lanka Cricket, Jayantha Dharmadasa. He unveiled a plaque at the back of the building, snipped a ribbon at the front, and led the presentation delegation up to the players' balcony while being serenaded by a pair of Kandyan drummers in their traditional red and white costumes.

The ceremony was attended by approximately 30 dignitaries, mediamen and cricketers, including two representatives from the England squad, Paul Collingwood and Phil Mustard, who had no match preparations to be getting on with, and so popped along for the show. A ceremonial oil lamp was lit to symbolise the light of hope and success, and a series of dedication speeches followed, interrupted only by a two-minute silence in memory of the former treasurer of the club, Sam de Silva, who had died of cancer the previous day.

Although he provided sound fiscal judgment during a five-year tenure from 1980 to 1985, de Silva's greatest legacy is that he is the father of the club's greatest ever player. It's not an easy call to make; a staggering 25% of Sri Lanka's international cricketers have come through its doors, including four of the current crop - Lasith Malinga, Upul Tharanga, Farveez Maharoof and Kumar Sangakkara. But Aravinda de Silva, World Cup winner and bona fide legend, would top the charts for most of the people present.

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	Paul Collingwood and Phil Mustard join the dedication ceremony © Andrew Miller

Aravinda's earliest school games took place on the Senanayake ground that also backs onto the NCC. It lies a short hop over a concrete wall, directly opposite the new pavilion, which was where another stalwart of the club, Ranjit Fernando, had set up shop for the morning. Ranjit, a Sky commentator and former World Cup wicketkeeper, has been a member of the club for 47 years, including a one-year stint as president in 2005. That's quite long enough to work out the best vantage point in the ground, and as we sat beneath the branches of a cashew tree, fanned by a gentle westerly breeze, it was hard to argue with his judgment.

Part of the NCC's charm, as Ranjit pointed out, was the complete absence of advertising hoardings. With its magnificent manual scoreboard and attractively archaic old pavilion, the ground felt as venerable as the club itself, which was founded in 1888 as a catch-all ("Nondescript") alternative to the many racially aligned teams in and around Colombo - such as the Moors, Tamil Union and, of course, CCC, which was predominantly European until the 1950s.

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Even in settings such as this change is inevitable, hence the creation of the new pavilion to enable the club to expand. "The members didn't want to deface the old one," said Ranjit, "but the unfortunate thing is that there were two lovely trees there which we had to do away with." One used to be on the site of the pavilion itself, the other by the car-park, where a busy open-air swimming complex had been constructed in a bid to swell the club's coffers.

It is a slight regret perhaps, but the ground has endured such indignities before and survived to tell the tale. During the Second World War, for instance, the NCC and SSC were both requisitioned by the British to form one long runway for the Royal Air Force. The remnants now lie beneath several layers of turf, and the only outward sign is the firmness of the concrete beneath one's fielding spikes.

	Chilled out: One local inhabitant isn't too bothered by the tight security in Colombo © Andrew Miller

Two books caught my eye as I was perusing the gift shop at the team hotel this morning, killing time before England's training session began. In among the postcards, guidebooks and polka-dotted bikinis were a pair of weighty publications, "Fractured Paradise" and "A Divided Isle", that told the tale of the traumas that have undermined Sri Lanka's standing on the world stage.

By rights, Sri Lanka should be one of the world's most alluring tourist hotspots. It has it all - ancient civilisations, stunning beaches, friendly people and an appealing night-life, to name but a few of its ticks in the box. None other than Marco Polo rated it as "the finest island of its size" that he ever encountered, and he saw a fair bit in his time.

What he didn't see or foresee, however, was the unending friction between the Government and the Tamil Tigers. On England's last tour in 2003-04, a ceasefire had only recently been signed and a sense of optimism could be detected. Since then, however, the détente has begun to unravel with renewed hostilities to the north of the country, and in August 2006 South Africa's cricketers had to abandon their one-day tour after a fatal bomb blast occurred near the Prime Minister's official residence in Colombo.

Such atrocities couldn't be further from the thoughts of England's cricketers, who are possibly the most chilled-out tour party of the decade, but there's no mistaking the edginess of the present security situation. My hotel, at the northern end of the Galle Face Road which runs along the sea-front, lies on the fringe of the old Fort area of the city, in which numerous government buildings are situated. Barricades line the street on both sides, and armed guards watch you as you move to and fro.

The guards are more of a reassurance than a hindrance, although they take their job understandably seriously. Yesterday I wandered out down to the promenade to take a photo of a rather grand colonial building with big doric pillars and a fluttering Sri Lankan flag. Instantly a whistle was blown and I was asked, very politely, to delete the image. It may be picturesque but the building is also very much in use - it was once the country's parliament building, and now serves as the Presidential Secretariat.

It's not just the Fort area that is under close surveillance, however. Police and Army checkpoints litter the capital, and no tuk-tuk journey is complete without at least two stop-and-searches. By and large it is merely a case of the driver hopping out and flashing his ID - a process that is carried out with utter compliance by both parties - but the frequency of the posts is staggering. In places there are less than 100 yards between one checkpoint and the next.

	The players' tent is not the most comfortable place to be when Colombo's daily deluge arrives © Andrew Miller

Who says that journalistic standards are slipping? Not the members of the media lined up at the Colombo Cricket Club, that's for sure. Four years ago, on England's last visit, we were housed in the bleak but undeniably functional whitewashed press box next to the scoreboard at the far end of the ground. The view of the pitch was excellent, although the creaky wooden trestle tables, intermittent power supplies and tandoori oven atmosphere were less so. Also, the vantage-point came with a certain sense of detachment, as all the action seemed to take place in and around the grand colonial pavilion at the opposite end of the ground.

Things are much more civilised this time around. Now the press are lined up on the pavilion verandah, beneath a bank of pankahs, with easy access to the fridge, the internet, the bar (post-play only, of course), and not least, the players. Quite what the players themselves make of the new arrangements is a matter of debate, however. They've been shunted down the steps and onto the grass beneath us, where they've spent the last three days lounging beneath a blue boxing-ring sized marquee - which is not the most comfortable place to be when Colombo's daily deluge arrives …

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The pitch-side positioning does have one advantage for England's cricketers though. It allows them easy access to the undergrowth whenever the CCC's serpent mascot makes an appearance. Having been hounded out of its old home by constant media intrusion on Monday, the slippery one had set up camp beneath a pile of rocks behind the boundary hoardings to the left of the pavilion, which was fine until he was caught basking in the sun ten minutes before lunch today.

Within seconds Matthew Hoggard was leading a rampage towards the scene, where he set about scouring the rocks with a broomhandle while his team-mates peered in with varying degrees of trepidation. Not surprisingly, the poor creature went to ground after that … but not for long. After lunch, a three-piece brass band arrived and set up shop a few metres from the scene. Their medley of Harry Belefonte numbers was clearly too much for its delicate reptilian hearing, and so he had no option but to break cover and slither for the trees.

He wasn't quick enough. Hoggard was back on the scene in a flash, and emboldened by the news that the beast was nothing more than a very well-fed rat-snake (bad-tempered but essentially harmless - except to rats of course), he decided to tweak its tail. It didn't quite have a hissy fit, but that final indignity did hasten its snakely sprint for the undergrowth, and for the last fifteen minutes, it has not been seen again …

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The snake hasn't been the only multiple sighting in this match. Throughout yesterday's morning session, a bizarre ritual was enacted on the boundary's edge. Aside from the flannelled fools in the middle, most sensible folk were hiding in the shade or, if they did prefer to be in the sun, were at least motionless while they basked.

Not so one puzzling chap, who for a full two-and-a-half hours traipsed solemnly but determinedly round and round and round the perimeter of the ground. He was not jogging, but nor was he ambling. This was a vigorous power-walk, and it caused all manner of unexpected mental arithmetic among the spectators. A posse of the Barmy Army advance guard timed his average lap at four-and-a-half minutes, which means that he must have put in upward of 30 laps, which means that at 2 x 3.14 x 60 metres for the radius of the pitch, he must have covered a distance of …

God knows. He wasn't that interesting.

	'When you've got a sweaty Matthew Hoggard towering over you, armed with an inquisitive branch, its best to keep a low profile' © Andrew Miller

Normally when lunch is called on a baking hot day in the subcontinent, a cricketer's first instinct is to leg it for the pavilion to hide in the shade and take on board several gallons of liquid. Not so on the first day of England's tour match in Colombo. The cool of the players' marquee may have been beckoning them, but as soon as the umpires released them from their duties, eight of the team instantly sprinted in the opposite direction.

Very soon they had set a trend - within minutes half the media, most of the spectators and several pointy-stick wielding groundstaff were all gathered around a rubble-strewn wall, peering down onto what, to judge by the excited chatter, was a very, very big visitor.

"Naya, naya!" was the word doing the rounds. Coiling around the bricks, bushes and general detritus - and looking not a little alarmed at suddenly becoming the centre of attention - was a large greeny-yellow cobra.

Its colour may have been perfect for hiding in the proverbial manner, but this one had made its home out of an abandoned piece of grey piping, which was jutting out from the soil at the angle perfect for easy slithering. Lurking just to its left, although by now very much out of sight, was a second such creature. When you've got a sweaty Matthew Hoggard towering over you, armed with an inquisitive branch, its best to keep a low profile.

The size of the snake was much disputed. The best judge in the England camp was probably Andy Flower. He is well used to such creatures from his days in Zimbabwe, but even he was apparently heard to swear gently under his breath when he turned up for his viewing. Graeme Swann, on the other hand, was rather more blasé. He was a latecomer to the gawping, having been told by his team-mates that it was at least "eight metres" - all he could see by the time he turned up was the last measly six inches.

But for Swann, as with all the one-day tourists, such sightings are old hat. At Dambulla several of the squad came across a "Killer King Cobra" (copyright The Sun) during a training run, and were so inspired they went on to win their next three matches. "Let's hope it's a good omen," said Swann. "That one was only a four-footer, but this one was of anaconda proportions …"

Either way, it fared better than the last snake to interrupt an England Test tour. In Bangladesh four years ago, a significantly smaller version fell from a tree surrounding the BKSB ground in Dhaka, causing the most disciplined stampede imaginable from the hundred or so spectators gathered round the pitch. That one was soon clubbed to death with a combination of bricks and sticks. But England nevertheless went on to win the series 2-0, so the snake-sightings are clearly a one-way benefit.

For the rest of the day, snake corner at backward square leg was an uncomfortable place to be posted, especially on a day when so many rusty fast bowlers were on show. With competition for places at a premium, a spate of leg-side long-hops might have been a subtle way to eliminate a few new-ball rivals - ("Sorry Hoggy, would you mind fetching that massive six out of the undergrowth … oh sorry …"), but in the end Vaughan selected Monty, his premium spinner, to patrol the rope and keep his team-mates on the straight and narrow. He's capable of producing a few spitting cobras of his own.