First Sri Lankan victory in world cup ... against Afghanistan

First Sri Lankan victory in world cup ... against Afghanistan

The Sri Lankan team was fortunate enough to record their first victory in the world cup tournament. Though this was a satisfactory win, the shaky manner in which the Sri Lanka team played the game in the presence of Afghanistan was subjected to negative comments of critics. 

Only a few batsmen of the Sri Lanka side were successful while the fielding was a setback. The Sri
Lankan team who initially arrived at the crease amassed a total of 201 runs all out at the end of 36.5 overs, play was curtailed with rains coming down intermittently, causing some delay. Kusal Perera notched 78 runs, Dimuth 30 runs and Thirimanna scoring 25 runs -- but the rest of the batsmen failed to score more than 20 runs each.Kusal Mendis, Angelo Matthews and Dhananjaya de Silva flopped with the bat in this game too as in the previous game, thus reaping negative comments from critics. 

With rain hampering proceedings, Afghanistan was left with a target of 187 runs to be scored in the space of 41 overs. However, it was Nuwan Pradeep who bagged 4 wickets for 31 runs with Lasith Malinga grabbing 3 wickets for 39 runs who managed to turn the game round in Sri Lanka's favour; thus making things difficult for Afghanistan to reach their target. Thereby Sri Lanka trounced Afghanistan by 35 runs. Nuwan Pradeep was the Man of the Match.