Sri Lanka vs Australia ODI match Melbourne 29 February, 2008 – A Fun Report
Other possible headlines
- Hayden snubbed. Dropped.
- Will this be the last innings by Jayasuriya abroad? or maybe the last ever?
- Without, Chaminda Vaas, the attack looked impotent (initially).
- Gilly was on fire.
- Ponting just refused to score. He took 11 balls to score 1!!
- the victory was brought by Kulasekara and Amerasinghe, two rookie bowlers
Sri Lanka won the toss and chose to bat! Not surprising, but last week at the same venue they had chosen to bowl first and predictably lost. As predicted here, the only semblance of a chance at Sri Lanka beating Australia lay in batting first. Surprisingly Vaas and Hayden were dropped. Hayden apparently may have been snubbed since a lot of people felt he was let off too lightly. And Cricket Australia had indicated that the Aussie cricketers had double standards.
Well, Perera in his new role started slowly. With Lee and Bracken bowling as well as ever, Sri Lanka was very cautious. However, they started losing wickets soon. Jayasuriya nowadays plays small cameos and did another such one. Will this be the last innings by Jayasuriya? Maybe the last one abroad?
For once Sangkarra magic did not work and Sri Lanka were down at 4/61. Here Jayawardene was joined by comparably successful Dilshan Tillekaratne and they enabled Sri Lanka to get to a respectable total. Sri Lanka juiced every ounce of their batting. I mean they were bowled out on the last ball scoring 221 which didn’t seem a big score to defend.
Without, Chaminda Vaas, the attack looked impotent. Australia began on a very positive note, and in no time had 100 on board without any loss of wickets. Gilly was on fire. It was just too good too be true. All bets were now on Australia winning easily. It looked too easy and the party had already began. Just a trifle too early. Newbie Kulasekara came for his second spell to join Muralitharan. And Hopes fell. And Ponting just refused to score. He took 11 balls to score 1!! A team which was right on top scored 1 run in 4 overs!! Australia were suddenly choking on themselves. From 107/0 they went to 123/6 and Sri Lanka could sense an impossible victory. And most importantly this victory was brought by Kulasekara and Amerasinghe, two rookie bowlers. A potent signal that the time for change of gaurd has come for Sri Lanka. A late rearguard action by Brett Lee and Bracken brought Australia over 200, but then in a stroke of genius Jayasuriya was introduced with Australia just 13 runs away. Well, Jayasuriya just need the minimum, one ball, to seal the victory!
(the above are written in a funny mood and not intended to hurt your sentiment – i doubt if any actual players gets time to read – so please don’t (get) hurt yourself defending them)
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March 12th, 2008 at 6:06 pm
[...] predicted by this site, Jayasuriya is headed for the pavilion. He has served the Sri Lankan team pretty well and t was anyway time for him to step down, I just [...]