Lanka's success due to Tharanga's batting - Mahela

Chris Dhambarage reporting

CRICKET: Sri Lankan captain Mahela Jayawardena attributed his teams success in the second qualifying round match of the International Cricket Council Champions Trophy Mini World Cup to the brilliant batting of Upul Tharanga and the aggression of the fast bowlers.

Sri Lankan cruised to an emphatic 144 run victory against Zimbabwe on Tuesday following their 37 run triumph over Bangladesh in the curtain raiser match and have now virtually booked a place in the main competition of the Champions Trophy which gets underway on Sunday.

Sri Lanka will take on the West Indies on Saturday in Mumbai to decide the qualifier one and qualifier two respectively.

Skipper Jayawardena said that Lasith Malinga has come a long way from where he started and his performance is something special. Malinga of course did not play much one day cricket early but has matured a lot and is now bowling really well.

Jayawardena said that his young fast bowlers are putting their hands up and are showing what they are capable of doing on the field and hoped that they would carry on with the same form.

Paceman Malinga captured three wickets as Zimbabwe were dismissed for 141 runs while chasing Sri Lanka's challenging total of 285 for 7.

Jayawardena also praised the batting of Upul Tharanga who completed his second successive century and altogether his fifth one day international century for the year 2006. Tharanga has been batting magnificently during the last year and the most significant fact about him is how well he has played under different conditions in New Zealand, Australia and England.

The Sri Lankan captain said that Tharanga has now blossomed into a top class opening batsman and has the potential to adjust himself according to different conditions.

He said that the wicket was slow and considering the pace Zimbabwe bowled it was not easy but Tharanga and Sangakkara played really smart cricket to post a match winning partnership at the end.

Even then skipper Jayawardena is still concerned about the number of extras they conceded in their last two outings. Sri Lanka gave away as many as 36 extras against Bangladesh and a further 27 in the game against Zimbabwe. But Jayawardena said that they could soon rectify that as they have performed much better than their previous game.

Jayawardena was also worried about his own performance and Sanath Jayasuriya who is yet to produce a big innings.

But he was happy that the team was moving in the right direction and is hoping that he could score some runs in the next outing. (Ahemedabad, Wednesday)