ICC U/19 Cricket World Cup

Lanka survive a Scots scare before winning

BY SA'ADI Thawfeeq

HOST Sri Lanka were given a scare by unknown Scotland before winning their opening ICC under 19 World Cup match by four wickets at the R. Premadasa Stadium yesterday.

Scotland gave a good account of them recovering from a hopeless position of 30-5 to make a respectable 186 after being put in to bat on a seaming pitch and then had Sri Lanka struggling at 98-5 before lack of experience finally made the difference between the two sides. Sri Lanka eventually won in the 40th over passing Scotland?s total by scoring 187-6.

What should have been a walk in the park for Sri Lanka turned out to be a struggle in the end. A combination of factors starting with a mix up between openers Karunaratne and Zoysa, some loose batting from the middle order and lively bowling by Gordon Goudie provided a perfect start to the tournament.

Following heavy rain the previous day, the toss played a vital role and Sri Lanka were fortunate they won it because one dreads to think what the consequences would have been had Sri Lanka batted first.

The home team can count themselves fortunate that Scotland were let down by some poor catching and bowling.

The crucial of those misses was the catch offered by Serasinghe at 34 off Macleod. Iqbal at third man dropped it. Sri Lanka at that stage was 129-4 in the 30th over and anything could have happened. Serasinghe was dropped again soon afterwards off a no-ball.

To add to their woes Scotland also conceded 38 extras which they could ill-afford to do especially in a one-day match.

Scottish captain Kasiam Farid admitted: "In a one-day game extras are always going to be costly. It's always going to take it out one way or the other. We were in a very good position to disappoint Sri Lanka and all the boys put in a big effort to do that."

Sri Lanka captain Angelo Mathews said that the game was an eye-opener for his team and added that he was not happy with their performance, although they ran out eventual winners.

"We should have won more convincingly. We started off well in the morning but we threw it away in the latter stages. We can't afford to make such mistakes in the future games. We need to take these matches very seriously and perform better," said Mathews.

With regard to failure of the the top order batting, Mathews said: "We haven't done very well in the recent past and we'll need to come good soon if we are to make an impact. The batsmen are normally free scoring. They will have to concentrate more on their batting and stick it out," he said.

Mathews admitted that when they lost four early wickets for 54 runs they were a bit concerned in the dressing room but two good partnerships saw them through.

Serasinghe made use of the lapses to top score for his side with 64 off 91 balls (6 fours, 1 six), but Farid bagged the man of the match award for his fighting knock of 76 off 89 balls (4 fours, 2 sixes) without which Scotland would have been hard pressed to come up with a competitive total. Sri Lanka's seamers Mathews, Perera and Karunanayake revelled in the conditions capturing eight of the ten wickets. The Sri Lankan batting was pushed onto the back foot by Goudie who rocked them with three wickets for 10 runs in his first spell of seven overs.

It was Scotland's inexperience that allowed Sri Lanka to wriggle out of a tight situation. Both sides were guilty of being penalized for no-balls and wides which contributed to a total of 69 extras in the match.

SCOTLAND 

A. Hislop b Karunanayake   			 13 
G. Goudie c Karunaratne b Mathews 		  0
M. Iqbal c Pathirana b Mathews 			  3
R. Cannon c Soysa b Perera 			  3
K. Farid st Soysa b Pathirana 			 76
R. Berrington c Soysa b Perera			  0
S. MacLannen lbw b Karunanayake			  9
U. Mohammed c Karunaratne b Pushpakumara 	 23
A. Shahzad not out 				 15
C. Macleod c Karunaratne b Perera		  4
S. Weeraratne c Pathirana b Karunanayake	  9
Extras (lb-4, nb-9, w-18)     			 31
TOTAL (all out, 49.4 overs, 211 mins) 		186

FALL OF WICKETS: 1-2, 2-15, 3-24, 4-26, 5-30, 6-95, 
                 7-155, 8-155, 9-173, 10-186.

BOWLING: Mathews 9-3-30-2 (1w),
         Perera 10-3-26-3 (6w, 1nb),
         Karunanayake 8.4-0-34-3 (2nb), 
         Pathirana 10-0-45-1 (1w, 4nb)
         Weeraratne 6-0-30-0 (2w, 2nb),
         Serasinghe 2-0-11-0, 
         Pushpakumara 4-1-6-1. 

SRI LANKA 

D. Karunaratne c Hislop b Goudie  		 14
R.S.S.S. de Zoysa run out    			  9
S.C. Serasinghe b Berrington       		 64
H. Fernando lbw b Goudie   			  0
A. Priyantha c Cannon b Goudie    		  0
P.D.M.A. Cooray c Berrington b Farid     	 19
A.D. Mathews not out      			 37
K.P.S.P. Karunanayake not out     		  6
Extras (lb-5, nb-12, w-21)   			 38
TOTAL (6 wkts, 39.5 overs, 173 mins) 		187

DID NOT BAT: N.L.T.C. Perera, S.S. Pathirana, P.M. Pushpakumara. 

FALL OF WICKETS: 1-23, 2-41, 3-41, 4-54, 5-98, 6-167. 

BOWLING: Weeraratne 6.5-0-48-0 (6w, 4nb), 
         Goudie 10-1-25-3 (6w), 
         Shahzad 5-1-18-0 (5w, 3nb), 
         Macleod 8-0-41-0 (3w, 5nb),
         Farid 6-0-27-1 (1w), 
         Berrington 4-0-23-1. 

Man of the Match: K. Farid (Scotland)