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England's batting let them down as they descended to a 2-0 series deficit against Sri Lanka, and seventh defeat in their last eight one-day internationals.
Despite Ravi Bopara's second successive half-century, England stuttered almost throughout against the home spinners on an awkward, used pitch at the Premadasa Stadium.
Then even after two early breakthroughs, they could never get a foothold in this second fixture of seven - whose wider significance came in its timing two days after the death of Phillip Hughes.
A minute's silence was held before play, and both teams took the field wearing black armbands in memory of the Australia Test batsman.
England captain Alastair Cook explained on Friday it was mutually agreed here that the best way to pay respects to Hughes, who died of his injuries after being hit by a bouncer, was to play cricket.
When England did that, they got off to a poor start - and never became competitive.
In a match shortened by rain to 45 overs per side, Sri Lanka raced to victory with more than 10 of their share - and eight wickets - to spare as Mahela Jayawardene (77no) and Kumar Sangakkara (67no) put England in their place after two early breakthroughs.
In the absence of a 50 stand for the tourists, only Bopara (51) and Joe Root's hard-working contributions got England anywhere near 200 after Cook had made the obvious choice to bat first on a surface unlikely to become any easier.
In the two middle-order batsmen's 93 combined runs, they managed just a solitary boundary each out of England's aggregate of eight - paltry in comparison to their hosts' 22.
Tillakaratne Dilshan set out to make the most of any pace on the new ball at the start of Sri Lanka's reply - and with a mishook over the wicketkeeper's head first ball, he then added two more fours in Steven Finn's opening over.
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England hit back, Finn striking when Kusal Perera miscued a pull to midwicket, and then Dilshan getting underneath an attempted big hit at Moeen Ali and skying a catch to Chris Woakes at mid-off.
But the old firm of Jayawardene and Sangakkara took over in an unbroken stand of 149, each easing past their 50s - although the left-hander was dropped on 39 when Chris Woakes ought to have held a return chance.
Moeen, who made a maiden hundred in defeat here on Wednesday, was England's first batsman to go this time - followed by Ian Bell and then Cook in quick succession.
Moeen charged at Dilshan, the off-spinner taking the new ball with captain Angelo Mathews, got in a tangle and was bowled off his pad in the second over.
Bell, in his 150th ODI, also tried to go on the attack but merely hit Rangana Herath high to long-off.
Then in the next over Cook mistimed a sweep, lofting off an upper edge when the intention appeared to be to hit down, and was caught at deep square-leg off Dilshan.
The captain has therefore in this format made only one half-century in his last 18 innings.
From 37 for three, Eoin Morgan and Root needed to rebuild - and doubled the score before the Irishman poked a simple catch to cover off Thisara Perera.
Root and Bopara dug in for a scurrying stand of 42 which ended when the Yorkshireman missed a push to leg and was lbw to Mathews.
When Jos Buttler edged on to leg-stump, in a belated first over from frontline seamer Dhammika Prasad, England were running out of resources to attack in the batting powerplay.
They eked out 31 for one - an acceptable outcome in the circumstances - albeit with the sting in the tail of Woakes' wicket, stumped off Ajantha Mendis (three for 33) with the penultimate ball of the 40th over.
Bopara had just had a moment of fortune against the same bowler, his mis-pull on 44 dropped by Mathews - but there was precious little more to come, once he swept Mendis to the captain at midwicket, and soon afterwards England were all out with two overs unused.
Another 30 runs might have made this match interesting - but without them, England had little chance and urgently need to arrest their slide here if they are to get back on track in this World Cup winter.
