News

Sri Lanka make steady inroads

The Bulletin by Andrew Miller

March 28, 2011

Martin Guptill dropped anchor for New Zealand with a gritty 39 from 65 balls, but Sri Lanka's varied attack was beginning to exert its influence on a worn surface at the Premadasa Stadium, as they claimed three key scalps to restrict their opponents to 93 for 3 after 25 overs of their semi-final clash in Colombo.

After winning the toss and choosing to bat first, New Zealand set themselves to be positive from the outset, with Guptill leaning into a fine flick over midwicket to dispatch Lasith Malinga's fifth delivery to the boundary. Brendon McCullum followed suit by galloping down the track to loft Rangana Herath's second ball down the ground, and then dropped to one knee to time a superb sweep over square leg for six.

But in between the boundary shots, runs proved stiflingly hard to come by, and in the eighth over McCullum's patience ran out. He sized up another slog-sweep against Herath but chose the wrong line to attack. The ball held its line to fizz past his outside edge and clip off stump, and McCullum was on his way for 13 from 21 balls.

Jesse Ryder, the hero of New Zealand's stunning quarter-final victory over South Africa, once again looked in good order as he cracked Ajantha Mendis fiercely past point for his first boundary, before leaning into a fraction of width from Angelo Mathews to ease his second four through the covers.

But Muttiah Muralitharan, who looked barely a quarter fit when he dived over a flick from Guptill to let four easy runs slip through his fingers at short fine leg, responded with a ripper of a delivery straight after the drinks break. Lured into another cut, Ryder was already committed to the shot as the ball gripped and bounced, and Kumar Sangakkara held onto the top edge.

All the while, Guptill was bedding down and building for the big one. But the strength of Sri Lanka's bowling is in its variety, and when Malinga returned for his second spell in the 21st over, he instantly found his range. Ross Taylor dug out a fierce late swinger that zipped through third man for four, but two balls later, Guptill was not so lucky. A brutal late-swinging yorker detonated his middle stump, and New Zealand had slumped to 84 for 3.

These two teams have been in this position plenty times before. New Zealand have reached the semi-finals in six of the ten World Cups to date, a prolific record from a habitually under-rated team, while Sri Lanka have made it this far for the third consecutive tournament, having been knocked out by the eventual winners Australia in 2003, before beating the Kiwis at the same stage four years ago, thanks to a brilliant hundred from Mahela Jayawardene at Sabina Park.

Prior to the match, Daniel Vettori was outspoken in his criticism of the wicket, seeing as it is the same surface on which Sri Lanka beat England by ten wickets last Saturday, and sure enough spin was coming to the fore. New Zealand, however, chose to exchange Luke Woodcock, the third spinner, for the left-arm seam of Andy McKay, who is himself a replacement for Kyle Mills, who has been withdrawn from the squad through injury.

Sri Lanka 1 Tillakaratne Dilshan, 2 Upul Tharanga, 3 Kumar Sangakkara (capt & wk), 4 Mahela Jayawardene, 5 Chamara Silva, 6 Thilan Samaraweera, 7 Angelo Mathews, 8 Lasith Malinga, 9 Muttiah Muralitharan, 10 Rangana Herath, 11 Ajantha Mendis

New Zealand 1 Brendom McCullum (wk), 2 Martin Guptill, 3 Jesse Ryder, 4 Ross Taylor, 5 Scott Styris, 6 Kane Williamson, 7 Nathan McCullum, 8 Jacob Oram, 9 Daniel Vettori, 10 Tim Southee, 11 Andy McKay