Experienced batter Angelo Mathews has been selected as the replacement for the injured Matheesha Pathirana in the Sri Lanka squad for the rest of the ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup 2023, ThePapare reliably learns.
Reporting from Bangalore, India
20-year-old right-arm seamer Matheesha Pathirana was ruled out of the competition due to a shoulder injury. The selectors have picked 36-year-old Mathews instead of the seam bowling option of Dushmantha Chameera in the squad to strengthen the middle order, which has been struggling throughout the competition so far.
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Mathews, who arrived in India last week as one of the Travelling Reserves, will bring a wealth of experience to the Sri Lankan middle order, and will bat at number six against England on the 26th of October at M. Chinnaswamy Stadium.
Mathews’ name has been sent to the ICC Event Technical Committee by Sri Lanka Cricket on Tuesday. The ICC is most likely to approve the injury replacement within the day.
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Mathews will be Sri Lanka’s second injury replacement in the competition. Earlier, Skipper Dasun Shanaka was replaced by all-rounder Chamika Karunaratne after the former was ruled out of the competition due to a quadricep injury.
Maheesh Theekshana, who missed Sri Lanka’s first training session on Monday evening, returned to training on Tuesday afternoon. According to reliable sources, the MRI scan done on the Sri Lankan spinner has shown no major concerns, and he will most probably take the field on Thursday against the former champions, England.
England last beat Sri Lanka in the Men’s ODI World Cups in 1999. Since then, Sri Lanka has won in four consecutive World Cups in 2007, 2011, 2015, and 2019.
