Sri Lanka bowled out for 171 despite lower order fight back

Rex Clementine in Bangalore

Sri Lanka’s lower order showed their batting unit what application is all about as they stitched some valuable partnerships to get the team’s total to 171 in their last World Cup fixture against New Zealand here in Bangalore yesterday.

At 105 for seven, the writing was on the wall for the former champions, but Maheesh Theekshana teamed up with Dushmantha Chameera and Dilshan Madushanka to help the side to a total of 171.

The last wicket added 43 valuable runs and if not for that, Sri Lanka would have been shot out for 130. Both Madushanka and Theekshana went onto record their career best scores. Theekshana put a high value for his wicket and finished on 38 off 91 balls with three fours.

There was some fireworks by Kusal Perera, who struck form in his last outing reaching a 22 ball half-century that included nine fours and two sixes. But there were one too many attacking shots from Perera and when he was dismissed Sri Lanka lost their fifth wicket with just 70 runs on the board.

Rest of the top order were a flop with Pathum Nissanka, Kusal Mendis, Sadeera Samarawickrama and Charith Asalanka all falling for single digit scores as Trent Boult claimed three wickets in his devastating opening spell.

Angelo Mathews (16) and Dhananjaya de Silva (19) delayed the inevitable but Sri Lanka were always playing catch up.The new ball had enough assistance for the New Zealand quicks and the Sri Lankan batters lacked character or intent to fight it out falling for loose shots.

Conditions were perfect for batting at Bangalore and New Zealand are expected to chase down the target with ease unless Madushanka comes up with a special performance.

A heavy defeat will see Sri Lanka’s Net Run Rate taking a heavy beating and the hopes of the team going through to the Champions Trophy is fading away quick.

If Sri Lanka lose to New Zealand, they have to expect Bangladesh to lose heavily to Australia in their final league game to have any hopes of going through.This has been a shambolic World Cup campaign for the Sri Lankans with the team getting everything wrong from team selection to batting or bowling first.

While their batting had seen many a collapse, bowling has failed to back Madushanka, who is the tournament’s highest wicket taker. The least said about Sri Lanka’s fielding the better as the team has spilled 16 catches, most by a team in this tournament.