Reuters
BRIDGETOWN — It was mission accomplished for Sri Lanka captain Mahela Jayawardene after his team’s 159-run victory over Scotland in their opening World Cup warm-up match on Monday.
The 1996 champions are considered a dark horse for the title in the Caribbean and underlined their intentions by making 294/7 before skittling Scotland for 135 in the 42nd over.
“Coming into the World Cup and playing a side like Scotland, whom we haven’t played before, we wanted to make sure that we concentrate really well, focus on the game in hand, and we did that,” Jayawardene said.
“All round we played really good cricket. We had a 100-run stand, we had a couple of 50-run stands. The only thing we would have liked is for one of the guys to bat through and get a hundred.”
Sanath Jayasuriya (77) and Upul Tharanga (70) exposed the lack of depth in the Scottish bowling attack, piling on 117 runs for the first wicket. Kumar Sangakkara later joined in the run fest by smashing 81 off 87 balls.
In spite of the emphatic result, Sri Lanka had started cautiously but Jayawardene said that had all been part of the strategy.
“We felt it was a bit slow and if we had given away early wickets it would have been difficult for us. Once the openers got used to the pitch we got our target — we got 120 in 20 overs.”
Even though his team whipped Scotland without much hassle, Jayawardene defended the inclusion of six non-Test nations at this year’s World Cup. More >>
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