Middle order woes continue to trouble Sri Lanka

It wouldn’t be a bad suggestion to say that Sri Lanka’s bowlers have been winning them the games in recent months and once again their batting failed to click in the World Cup fixture against Afghanistan in Pune on Monday.

Two sides that are locked on four points each and trying to edge past the other had to be on the money in this crucial clash but Sri Lanka’s batting flopped with none of the batters managing a half-century.

Sri Lanka replaced misfiring Kusal Perera with Dimuth Karunaratne but that move too didn’t produce the desired results as Dimuth was trapped leg before wicket for 16.

A 62-run partnership for the second wicket followed between Kusal Mendis and Pathum Nissanka before the opening batsman perished four runs short of a half-century.

At 134 for two, at the half-way mark, Sri Lanka were looking to double that score but both Kusal Mendis and Sadeera Samarawickrama fell in successive overs and it was back to square one.

Samarawickrama and Mendis had been the in-form batters for Sri Lanka and one of them had to dig deep but their departure spelt disaster.

Charith Asalanka has managed just one half-century in six games this tournament while Dhananjaya de Silva has managed none although he too has featured in six games and no significant contributions from them meant that Sri Lanka weren’t able to post 250.

At 185 for seven when Dushmantha Chameera was run out, Sri Lanka were staring down the barrel but Angelo Mathews and Maheesh Theekshana shared 45 runs for the eighth wicket to help the team get to a respectable total of 241.

Despite their efforts, Sri Lanka were still shot out inside 50 overs as Fazalhaq Farooqi finished with four wickets.

They were at least 30 runs short and will have to hope their bowlers bailed them out once again.

Sri Lanka have a hectic schedule this week where they play three games. After the Afghanistan game, they will fly to Bombay to play hosts India on Thursday and then will travel to Delhi to take on Bangladesh on Monday.

Sri Lanka’s last remaining game of the group stage is on the 9th of November against New Zealand in Bangalore and they need to win three of their remaining four games to have any hopes of going through to the semis.