Madhu Wicramasingha
In a more or less Now or Never face off against Bangladesh in their second Group D fixture at the Grand Prairie Stadium in Texas tomorrow Saturday morning, Sri Lanka’s top order batsmen face the major challenge of coming smoking to overcoming a long nagging problem of lack of depth in the mechanism in recent years which was badly exposed by the South Africans with Wanindu Hasaranga, Sadeera Samarawickrama and Charith Asalanka contributing just six runs collectively while Kusal Mendis just managed to get into double figures. The hard facts heading into this contest is that the Lankans need to get past the Bangladeshis needing to win at least 2 of their group matches to going into the next phase of the extravaganza.
That Wanindu Hasaranga and his charges will have to live up to absolute expectations if they are to keep their world cup hopes alive following the humiliating defeat to South Africa has become a stark reality where nothing short of the type of cricket that would snuff out the Bangladeshis is the challenging prospect.
Hasaranga, known to be an attacking player with bat and ball however, will need to assert his authority as the captain in the middle to calling the shots rather than looking to be guided by former captains Angelo Mathews in a reality of the fact that the captaincy responsibility has been passed on to him by the national selectors by their dependance in his showcasing ability.
However, Sri Lanka enjoy a buoyant 4-match win success of their last 5 matches against Bangladesh including a series win in Bangladesh earlier this year.
However, Bangladesh is not a cast to be underrated possessing a challenging all-round side with potential batsmen capable of winning matches for them as past results would indicate, and a longer warm-up campaign than any side at the T20 World Cup this year, having arrived in the US early and played a series against the hosts USA would be a confidence builder to their cup campaign.
Sources by – Sri Lanka Cricket
