da bwin： The Coca Cola Cup may have come alive last night after New Zealand’sshock victory over India, but for the Asian sub-continent as a wholeand Sri Lankan cricket fans in particular, the real action starts onSunday when Sri Lanka takes on India for
Charlie Austin21-Jul-2001The Coca Cola Cup may have come alive last night after New Zealand’sshock victory over India, but for the Asian sub-continent as a wholeand Sri Lankan cricket fans in particular, the real action starts onSunday when Sri Lanka takes on India for the first time.The good news is that Premadasa curator, Susil Ananda, is confidentthe pitch will be far superior to the crumbling surface last night.”The problem was too little grass,” he revealed. “We will use twowickets for the next four games, but these have a better grasscovering and should allow the batsmen to play more freely.”The ground authorities had not originally planned to re-use pitches,but were left with no other option after the three games in Dambullawere cancelled.Indian captain Saurav Ganguly blamed last night’s 84-run defeat on thepitch: “That was not the best one-day wicket to bat on. The ball wasnot coming onto the bat and that’s going to make things difficult forthe side batting second.”Certainly captains will now think twice before they elect to fieldfirst during the remaining games as both New Zealand on Wednesday andIndia on Friday struggled to time the ball on the dusty surface.Unfortunately Ganguly will be flipping the coin against one of thebest coin tossers in the game. Sanath Jayasuriya has a phenomenaltossing record in the Tests, where he has won it 12 times out of hislast 13 games. In the one-day game he has won on the last threeoccasions.Perhaps realising that Ganguly would be better served practicing hiscalling in his hotel room, the Indian team opted for optional netsthis afternoon, though all the reserves will have to train.It is unclear whether any changes will be made to the team. YuvrajSingh may be one, but he performed creditably with the ball. He canexpect a further chance before Amay Khurasia gets an opportunity.Ashish Nehra and Zaheer Khan bowled well enough to keep Ajit Agarkarand Debashis Mohanty on the sidelines. Left arm spinner Rahul Sanghviwould be useful, but could only play at the expense of the spinningall rounders and that would weaken the batting.Sri Lanka meanwhile practiced this morning and are in good spiritsafter their opening victory. Sanath Jayasuriya warned his team againstcomplacency.”Just because Sachin Tendulkar is not there we cannot relax,” he said.”They have been playing well and have some experienced players.Ganguly may be out of touch, but he can come back and play a topinnings at any time because he is a great player.”In fact Jayasuriya was quite disappointed with his side’s performanceagainst the Kiwi’s: “I was not happy with the total we got against NewZealand and we have to put more runs on the board against India. Itwas not easy to play your shots, but even so we should have scoredmore than 220.”He defended the policy to play six batsmen: “It is very important tohave all rounders in the side and if we had played an extra batsmanthen we would have lost a bowler. Suresh Perera made an importantcontribution, scoring 20 runs and taking that early wicket.”Sri Lanka are expected to name an unchanged side, though the wisdom ofplaying the trio of Sanath Jayasuriya, Avishka Gunawardene, and RomeshKaluwitharana, all of whom play in the same cavalier manner, will bedebated.