Sri Lanka continued their record of impressive performances in major tournaments, as they survived a late scare to qualify for the semi-finals of the ICC Champions Trophy after defeating Australia by 20 runs in their group stage match.
Even the weather gods enjoy Sri Lankan cricket it seems, as the rain surprisingly stayed away from the Oval Cricket Ground, making Sri Lanka the only team in Group A not to have played a rain affected match. This time it was as they took on Australia, in the all important final game of the group stage. While England had already qualified for the semi-finals, the other three teams were all in with a chance of being the second team to qualify at the start of this match.
The Australians needed to have their calculators out today. To go through to the semi-finals, Australia needed a big win to make up for their low net run rate. In order to know what exactly they required, Aussie skipper George Bailey inserted Sri Lanka in to bat on a brown pitch at the toss. For Sri Lanka the equation was much simpler: Win and go through to the next round. Anything else would send them home. Both teams fielded unchanged sides from their previous encounters, with Michael Clarke not being deemed fit enough to rejoin the Australians.
The Sri Lankans were pushed on the back foot early as they lost two quick wickets. Mitchell Johnson had Kusal Perera trapped in front off the third ball of the match, and the in form Sangakkara perished when he drove loosely to Glenn Maxwell off Clint McKay’s bowling.
With the score on 20 for 2, Australia may have envisioned bundling Sri Lanka out cheaply, but Sri Lanka kept up their recent habit of shuffling around the batting order, by promoting Lahiru Thirimanne ahead of Mahela Jayewardene. The move paid off, as Thirimanne together with Dilshan added 72 runs off 114 balls to set up a platform for Sri Lanka. Dilshan fell for an uncharacteristically subdued 34 but Thirimanne went on to register a half century, before finally perishing for 57 off 86 deliveries.
Australia looked to keep the scoring in check with wickets at regular intervals, but were undone by a sublime Mahela Jayewardene. Coming in at number 5, the elder statesman put on a display of his class and talent to keep the scoreboard ticking, scoring a fluent and apparently effortless 84 not out off 81 balls. Mahela also reached a personal milestone in this innings, becoming the third Sri Lankan Batsman to reach 11000 ODI runs. He found support in Dinesh Chandimal in the death overs and was able to propel Sri Lanka to a very healthy score of 253 for the loss of 8 wickets at the end of 50 overs.
Australia walked in to bat needing to knock off the runs in 29.1 overs in order to qualify. Already a tall ask to begin with, their ambitions suffered an early setback when Shane Watson was bowled by Nuwan Kulasekera in the second over. The Australian camp responded by sending in the million dollar IPL Buy, Glenn Maxwell at number 3 who started off positively, hitting Kulasekera for a four and a six consecutively. His partner Phil Hughes however, soon fell for 13, nicking one to Sangakkara off Kulasekera. Maxwell continued to take the attack to the Sri Lankan bowlers; blitzing 32 off 15 before Lasith Malinga came on and disturbed his stumps. Australia suffered another major setback when in form captain George Bailey was brilliantly run out by Kulasekera which all but ended any realistic chances of Australia qualifying. From that point it was Sri Lanka’s match to win as Australian wickets fell regularly, a family pattern for them in the last couple of months. Although wickets were falling at a steady rate, Australia were still maintaining a very healthy run rate meaning that Sri Lanka needed to get the remaining Aussie wickets in order to wrap up the match. However Sri Lanka seemed to take the foot off the gas after the fall of the seventh wicket, which allowed the Australians to get much closer to the target than they should have.
The game entered its tensest phase as Adam Voges maintained a gutsy rearguard resistance before finally perishing for 49 before the last pair of Clint McKay and Xavier Doherty gave the Sri Lankans quite a scare, by putting on 41 against a bowling attack that suddenly looked a bit toothless. Sri Lankan Captain Mathews came under some scrutiny for his apparent unwillingness to set attacking fields as the two tail-enders scored singles almost at will. His reluctance to bring Dilshan on earlier in the innings was also puzzling especially as the pitch seemed to be conducive for spin bowlers. Dilshan also has displayed a knack of creating opportunities at crucial times in the past, as he showed when he pulled off a stunning catch off his own bowling to dismiss McKay, wrapping up the Australian innings and putting Sri Lanka through to the Semi-Finals. Seamer Shaminda Eranga was again disappointing, and with Thisara Perera and Sachithra Senanayake also waiting in the sidelines, the Sri Lankan camp may well rethink its bowling approach for the knockout phase.
Mahela Jayewardene was named Man of the Match for his brilliant half century.
Sri Lanka will now face a familiar foe, India, in the semi-final at Cardiff on Thursday. The only other time they played an ODI at this venue, was in their loss to New Zealand in the group stage of the tournament.
Sri Lanka 253 – 8 (J’wardene 84* Thirimanne 57) defeat Australia 233
