A lifetime of following England demands caution, but Sunday's victory in Dambulla puts them within touching distance of what might just be their best set of one-day results since they swept all before them in Australia in 1986-87. Admittedly, this is not saying much: England remain the only major cricket nation never to have won a global trophy (and, no, the Akai Singer Champions Trophy in Sharjah doesn't count). But it was not so long ago that they were losing at home to West Indies on the back of a miserable World Cup. Heck, they would probably even have taken a 3-2 defeat had Sri Lanka offered it to them before the series started.
What makes England's two wins in Dambulla so refreshing is the fact that they overcame several Achilles heels in the process. Traditionally, any one of the following factors has been enough to scupper them: batting under lights, chasing in the subcontinent, milking the spinners, showing imagination on slow pitches. On Sunday, they sidestepped all four. And they did it at a venue where, before the second one-day international on Thursday, Sri Lanka had won nine in a row. Deep in the jungle, a citadel has been quietly dismantled.
Muttiah Muralitharan may or may not be back for Wednesday's fourth game in Colombo - at the moment it looks unlikely - but at least England would be able to play him with something approaching confidence now they have proved to themselves that Sri Lanka really should not have beaten them 5-0 two summers ago. And for what they are worth, the ICC rankings currently place Sri Lanka fourth, only three tiny points ahead of England.
They will also tell themselves that they have taken a series lead without a decent contribution from any of their top four. Between them, Alastair Cook, Phil Mustard, Ian Bell and Kevin Pietersen boast a best of 46 and a grand total of 171 runs from 12 innings. Right now, England are playing more like New Zealand or South Africa, scoring their most crucial runs from No5 and below.
The heroes have been players with something about them. Owais Shah can be forgiven his rush of blood on Sunday because he batted so beautifully in the second game. Ryan Sidebottom has moved from being a shaggy-maned horse for an English course to an all-pitch specialist (only Farveez Maharoof has a better economy rate in this series than Sidebottom's 3.47). Stuart Broad has now helped win two games with bat from No9. And Graeme Swann is proving that those two buses he missed in South Africa eight years ago were not in fact a metaphor for his career.
And then there's Paul Collingwood. The best thing that can be said about him is that he is doing an unexpectedly good job in glossing over the absence of Andrew Flintoff. Collingwood has bowled 25 overs in three games, and if he might never again encounter conditions which turn his honest dobbers into potentially lethal, ankle-threatening missiles, then he is at least playing to his strengths. He is also in danger of balancing the side.
We are not yet at the stage where the memories of England's one-day hopelessness over the past 15 years are a thing of the past. Far from it. But the progress they are making cannot be written off as a fluke.
Extract taken from the Spin, Guardian Unlimited's weekly take on the world of cricket.
