Vaas pilots WP North to easy win

Sri Lanka’s premier fast bowler Chaminda Vaas produced an inspired spell of bowling to spearhead the Western Province North team to an easy seven wicket victory over the Southern Province team in the second match of the Inter Provincial limited overs cricket tournament worked off at the Galle International Stadium yesterday.

The left arm seamer was in tremendous form as he picked up three wickets in one over to send the Southern Province team crashing to a mere 102 all out from 37.5 overs after been put into bat. Western Province reached their target quite convincingly scoring 104 for 3 in 28.2 overs.

Man of the match Vaas struck three vital blows during his fourth over while capturing a wicket in his first, second and fifth deliveries. He was on a hattrick at one stage after having dismissed Saman Jayantha and Indika de Saram in successive deliveries.

However Gihan de Silva survived the first ball and averted the hattrick before surrendering to the same bowler two balls later. That left the Southern Province team struggling at four runs for three wickets and they never recovered from there onwards and surrendered quite meekly at the end.

The Southern Province team of course suffered an early setback and had lost the services of skipper Sanath Jayasuriya with an injury. The dashing left hander however returned back to the crease and hit a top score of 27 from 33 deliveries with the help of four boundaries.

Jayasuriya departed in the 19th over with the total at 65 and thereafter wickets fell at regular intervals with Gayan Wijekoon adding the finishing touches with a three wicket haul.

Western Province North then reached their target quite easily despite losing three early wickets. Both openers Shantha Kalawitigoda and Avishka Gunawardena together with Ruwin Peiris contributed just 23 runs between them as they slumped to 29 for 3 by the 11th over of the innings.

However the Western Province North fourth wicket pair of Kaushal Silva and Thilina Kandamby averted any further setbacks with an unfinished stand of 75 runs that sealed the game in their favour.

Wicket keeper batsman Kaushal Silva remained unbeaten on 39 with four boundaries while Kandamby too struck the same number of boundaries during his unbeaten knock of 31.
 

SOUTHERN PROVINCE         
U. Tharanga b Wijekoon 			 7  
S. Jayasuriya c Silva b Prasad 		27         
S. Jayantha c Silva b Vaas 		 0  
I. de Saram lbw b Vaas 			 0  
G. de Silva c Pushpakumara b Vaas  	 0  
A. Rideegammanagedera lbw b Wijekoon 	10  
L. Dilhara c Silva b Prasad 		 3  
K. Kulasekara lbw b Wijekoon 		 2  
S. Senanayake not out 			16  
L. Malinga c Pushpakumara b Prasad 	18  
S. de Silva b Dissanayake 		 3  
Extras (b 1, lb 3, w 11, nb 1) 		16                                    
TOTAL (all out in 37.5 overs) 		102
FALL OF WICKETS: 1-4, 2-4, 3-4, 4-20, 5-54, 6-55, 7-58, 8-66, 9-90 
BOWLING: C. Vaas 5-2-11-3, N. Kulasekara 10-2-20-0, 
G. Wijekoon 8-1-29-3, D. Prasad 9-1-27-3, S. Dissanayake 5.5-0-11-1

WESTERN PROVINCE NORTH 
S. Kalavitigoda lbw b R’gammanagedera 	10  
A. Gunawardene b Malinga 		 1  
R. Peiris c Dilhara b Kulasekara 	12  
K. Silva not out 			39         
T. Kandamby not out 			31              
Extras (lb 3, w 7, nb 1)  		11 
TOTAL (for 3 wickets in 28.2 overs) 	104
 DID NOT BAT: C. Vaas, G. Wijekoon, N. Kulasekara, 
S. Dissanayake, M. Pushpakumara, D. Prasad           
FALL OF WICKETS: 1-6, 2-25, 3-29 
BOWLING: L. Malinga 7-2-22-1, S. de Silva 6-1-22-0, 
A. Rideegammanagedera  5-2-12-1, K. Kulasekara 4-0-17-1, L. Dilhara 3-0-13-0, 
S. Senanayake 3.2-0-15.