Cricket News sort by Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka will face Namibia in match number 4 of the T20 World Cup 2021 at the Sheikh Zayed Cricket Stadium in Abu Dhabi. This will be the second match of the Group A encounter in Round 1 of the ICC event. The match will be played at 7:30 PM IST and 6:00 PM local time.

Former Sri Lanka captains Kumar Sangakkara and Mahela Jayawardene hailed Lasith Malinga after the legendary pacer announced his retirement from all forms of cricket on Tuesday. While Sangakkara said that Malinga’s contribution to Sri Lanka and world cricket will stand for all time, Jayawardene recalled memories of the first time he faced the bowler with a slinging action.

Sri Lanka cricket great Muttiah Muralitharan feels that Sachin Tendulkar had a slight weakness against off-spin bowling. Murali, who remains the leading wicket-taker in Tests and ODIs with 800 and 530+ wickets respectively, dismissed Tendulkar 13 times in his career. Only former Australia pacer Brett Lee dismissed Tendulkar more times - 14. 

The recent series against Sri Lanka for the so called “second string Indian team” was meant to be an audition for the few spots that are still up for grabs in the lead up to the marquee T20 event scheduled later this year. The series, which consisted of three ODIs and as many T20Is, could be actually be divided into 2 phases - with one being the three one dayers and the first T20, where every Indian player from the touring party was available for selection, and the second being the post Krunal Pandya testing positive phase, where the number of available Indian batsmen was comparable to the number of spinners that Sri Lanka were fielding in their eleven.

Sri Lankan captain Dasun Shanaka hailed his bowlers after the hosts got the better of a depleted India by seven wickets in the third T20I to clinch the three-match series 2-1. Shanaka opined that this was the best Sri Lanka had bowled in the last few years.

Sri Lanka took full advantage of India’s weakened playing XI to win the second T20I in Colombo by four wickets and square the three-match 1-1. India were forced to play a new-look XI after Krunal Pandya tested COVID-19 positive on Tuesday. The visitors handed debuts to four players - Ruturaj Gaikwad, Devdutt Padikkal, Nitish Rana and Chetan Sakariya. India went in with only five batsmen with all the other batters in isolation.

The second T20I of the series between India and Sri Lanka has been postponed by a day after India all-rounder Krunal Pandya tested positive for COVID-19 on Tuesday. The match will now be played on Wednesday, July 28 at the R Premadasa stadium in Colombo. Krunal and eight other close contacts have been placed in isolation. According to reports, the close contacts include Prithvi Shaw and Suryakumar Yadav, who were due to fly to England for the Test series. As of now, no latest COVID cases have been reported from the Sri Lankan camp.

Team India pacer Bhuvneshwar Kumar expressed satisfaction at his performance after bowling the side to victory in the first T20I of the three-match series against Sri Lanka on Sunday. Kumar claimed excellent figures of 4 for 22 as India successfully defended a total of 164 in Colombo. The Indian pacer got the big wicket of Avishka Fernando and then ran through the lower order as the visitors rolled over the Lankans for 126 in 18.3 overs.

Former India opener Virender Sehwag feels that Manish Pandey may not get another chance to play for India in ODIs. And, even if he does, it may take a long time coming. Pandey played in all three matches of the ODI series against Sri Lanka but disappointed with scores of 26, 37 and 11. While Sehwag also named all-rounder Hardik Pandya as one of the letdowns, according to him, Pandey was the biggest disappointment.