da heads bet： Sri Lanka squashed Caribbean hopes for a face saving victory to end anotherwise ill-fated tour when they defeated West Indies by 34 runs to winthe LG Abans triangular series at Premadasa International Stadium onWednesday night
Charlie Austin19-Dec-2001Sri Lanka squashed Caribbean hopes for a face saving victory to end anotherwise ill-fated tour when they defeated West Indies by 34 runs to winthe LG Abans triangular series at Premadasa International Stadium onWednesday night.The hosts dominated the game, as they had been expected to, right from thetime man of the match and series Sanath Jayasuriya won an important toss inthe afternoon. Their batsmen posted a challenging 254 target, later reducedto 247 in 47 overs because of rain, but did have some nervy moments after acentury stand between openers Daren Ganga (50) and Chris Gayle (60).Both Ganga and Gayle struggled in early overs, playing and missingregularly, as the new ball darted around on a generally placid pitchfreshened by some light drizzle during the interval, before growing inconfidence and adding 111 in 148 balls.But when off-spinner Kumar Dharmasena knocked back Ganga’s middle stump, asthe right-hander tried to work the ball to leg shortly after reaching hisfourth half century of the tournament, the wickets started to tumble and therun rate quickly skyrocketed out of control.Gayle soon followed his partner, as he skewed a catch to backward point, toleave West Indies with two new batsmen at the crease. Ramnaresh Sarwan wasthen caught behind and West Indies, having lost three wickets for ten runs,were 121 for three.The ball turning and the fielding sharp, the innings stalled. Carl Hoopertried to resuscitate it with a breezy 34 but wickets continued to fall:Marlon Samuels was run out after calling for a suicidal second run, RicardoPowell was brilliantly caught by Upul Chandana running in from themid-wicket boundary, Hooper himself was also caught in the deep as he lookedfor his second six and Ridley Jacobs was stumped.Earlier in the day, Sri Lanka’s top order had performed solidly, with bothJayasuriya (64) and Jaywardene (63) scoring entertaining half-centuries. Runscoring was never easy, especially against the slower bowlers, thoughJayasuriya still managed to clump nine fours and a six.Sri Lank looked set for a huge total, on 154 for two at one stage, but afterthe dismissal of Marvan Atapattu (38) the innings fell away slightly, asfour batsmen were needlessly run out. Nevertheless, Muttiah Muralitharantook their total past 250 with a crowd pleasing six in the final over andsuch a target was always going to be tricky.