Australia missed out on the chance to successfully overturn three wickets in Sri Lanka's sole innings, after running through their allocated reviews inside the first 80 overs.

The most costly was a caught behind of Dinesh Chandimal, who edged a ball from Mitchell Starc on 30 but was given not out by umpire Kumar Dharmaseena.

Australia's players were adamant he edged it, but were powerless to have the call overturned.

The Sri Lankan right-hander then went on to score an additional 176 runs, with his unbeaten 206 the difference in the match as the hosts won by an innings and 31 runs.

The decision review system has long been an issue for Australia, most notably in the 2019 Ashes when they were unable challenge an lbw call that would have won them the famous Headingley Test.

But Cummins insisted this was not a blunder on their behalf, and that they had felt well within their rights to use their allocated three early.

One pertained to a caught down legside off Cummins, another was a tight lbw call that Angelo Mathews had just got bat on and the third was an appeal for a catch in close.

"We're always trying to get better at that," Cummins said.

"In the past we've burned reviews that we've looked back and thought they weren't a good chance, but especially the two yesterday we were really confident on both.

"We try to perfect and improve our systems.

"But unfortunately over here there's so many balls near edges and pads, it feels like there's more chances to use them up than back home. We'll keep working on it."

Monday marked Cummins' first loss as a captain in his nine Tests in charge, with a tough initiation given five of those have been in taxing conditions in Asia.

That's something that will likely prove helpful come next February's tour of India.

"Field placements and using the spin bowlers (were the biggest learning curves), I hadn't had a lot of experience with that.

"And just managing the tempo and even the bowler's spells.

"(Bowling) 180 overs out here, it happens quite a bit overseas, so managing different bowlers, trying to keep a relative control on the scoreboard and scoring rate."

Australian Associated Press