(Reuters) - Sri Lanka won the toss and chose to bat first in the first test against Pakistan on Friday. The hosts suffered a blow on the morning of the test when their left-arm fast bowler Chanaka Welegedera was ruled out with a sore shoulder.

Nuwan Pradeep returns to play his second test and will share the new ball with Nuwan Kulasekera, who also makes a comeback to the test team after two years.

Mohammad Ayub makes his test debut for Pakistan at the age of 32, replacing captain Misbah-ul-Haq who is serving a one-test ban because of his team's slow over-rate in the fifth one-day international last Monday.

The two teams play a series of three tests.

Teams:

Sri Lanka: Tillakaratne Dilshan, Tharanga Paranavitana, Kumar Sangakkara, Mahela Jayawardene (captain), Thilan Samaraweera, Angelo Mathews, Prasanna Jayawardene, Nuwan Kulasekara, Rangana Herath, Nuwan Pradeep, Suraj Randiv.

Pakistan: Mohammad Hafeez (captain), Taufiq Umar, Azhar Ali, Younis Khan, Mohammad Ayub, Asad Shafiq, Adnan Akmal, Abdur Rehman, Umar Gul, Saeed Ajmal, Junaid Khan.