Sri Lanka make it hard on themselves to qualify

• Afghanistan no longer the easy beats win by seven wickets

PUNE: Sri Lanka only made it harder for themselves to qualify for a place in the Cricket World Cup semi-finals when they lost a crucial game to Afghanistan by seven wickets at the MCA stadium in Pune Tuesday.

The game could hardly be termed a one-day contest after what we have seen in some of the other matches where both sides had made over 300 plus runs. It was slow moving and Sri Lanka’s total of 241 hardly represented a challenge to the powerful Afghanistan batting line-up which paced out the run chase beautifully to win with 28 balls to spare.

The win meant that Afghanistan keeps their hopes of making it to the semi-finals alive with three wins and six points in the bag and moving to fifth place, and Sri Lanka remain on four points with two wins and having to win their last three matches against India, Bangladesh and New Zealand to get even a whiff of a semi-final berth.

To the credit of Afghanistan, it must be said that they bowled and fielded brilliantly to pin Sri Lanka down to a total which was quite chaseable even on the slow surface which did not have any demons on it, but if the batsmen were prepared to spend some time in the middle, runs were there to be had.

Losing Rahmanullah Gurbaz for a duck to the fourth ball of the innings didn’t deter Afghanistan who phased out their run chase in a thoroughly professional manner, stitching together three half-century partnerships to see them home.

Rahmat Shah (62 off 74 balls, 7 fours), skipper Hashmatullah Shahidi (58* off 74 balls, 2 fours, 1 six) and Azmatullah Omarzai (73* off 63 balls, 6 fours, 3 sixes) all completed half-centuries to take Afghanistan home in style with the winning run coming off a dropped catch in the deep, which summed up the day for Sri Lanka.

Winning the toss and inserting Sri Lanka to bat first Afghanistan bowlers ensured they never got any momentum into their innings with only two half-century run partnership featuring the batting.

Following a subdued start where Sri Lanka scored 41/1 in the first power play, they somewhat managed to reach 134-2 before a double strike in successive overs by spinner Mujeeb-Ur-Rahman to send back Kusal Mendis (39) and Sadeera Samarawickrama (36) within the space of five runs pushed Sri Lanka back. Apart from a 45-run stand by Angelo Mathews (23) and Maheesh Theekshana (29) the batting was kept in check by some disciplined bowling.

Fazalhaq Farooqi was the pick of the Afghanistan’s bowlers making dents in the Sri Lankan batting line up each time he was brought onto bowl. He ended taking four wickets in an economical spell conceding only 34 runs. For Rashid Khan, the win could not have come at a better occasion. He was playing in his 100th ODI and he also picked up a wicket. Overall, the Afghanistan bowling was first rate. They didn’t bowl many loose balls and reaped the rewards for their discipline.