Winning in South Africa was better than winning at home – Aviskha

Sri Lanka ‘A’s victories over South Africa ‘A’ in the one-day series (2-1) and the unofficial 4-day test series (2-0) was described by Head coach Avishka Gunawardene as better than winning 

at home.

“We’ve beaten Afghanistan ‘A’, England Lions and South Africa ‘A’ in Sri Lanka in the last 12-15 months. We were looking forward to this tour to see how we perform. It was pleasing to see the same thing continuing outside Sri Lanka. It was even better than playing at home. This tour was the best so far. We haven’t beaten any team 2-0 in a 4-day series even in Sri Lanka,” said Gunawardene.

“Considering the fact that we had 6-7 Under-23 boys in both formats, it was a fairly young side, hardly any senior players unlike other ‘A’ team tours. Winning was not the objective but with Under-23 players in the side it was the first time that an ‘A’ team has won both the 4-day series and the ODI series in South Africa. More than the one-dayers, the highlight for me was winning both 4-day games. It was the first time we had won in South Africa.”

“All these young boys have a lot of talent. Pavan’s (Rathnayake) innings was exceptional under the circumstances because they gave us a target and we were never going to save the ‘test’ match, we were always going to win it. We had about 70 odd overs to chase, but we actually got it in 42 odd overs at six. That was exceptional.”

“It was Pavan’s first tour, he played his first 4-day ‘A’ team game. (Pasindu) Sooriyabandara was playing his 2nd or 3rd 4-day game. Even Nuwanidu (Fernando) has played a couple of games for Sri Lanka. Isitha (Wijesundara) is 27 but he is quite new to international cricket. For Ehsan Malinga and Under-19 Captain Dinura Kalupahana, it was their first ‘A’ team tour. There were a lot of debutants. Lahiru Udara and Oshada (Fernando) were the most senior players. It was nice to see a young bunch of boys going out there and enjoying themselves in the middle.”

To come to South Africa and win, Gunawardene said the tour would have given the players a lot of confidence.   

“Our target was for one batsman to get a 100 in every game. Oshada did that in the first game, the second game Lahiru Udara got a 100 in the first innings and Pavan in the second. Pasindu was consistent in the 4-dayers. Even in the ODIs we missed a 100 in almost every game. To me it was not about one person getting runs, everyone contributed. That to me was the highlight. Normally if you take a tour, one or two players get highlighted, but here everyone contributed to the side.”

Talking of the opposition they faced, Gunawardene said they had a pretty decent side. “The difference was it was early summer so the wickets were slightly flatter than it would be in a few weeks. It still had quite a lot of grass, but it was slightly flatter than what you would normally get in South Africa. If you put the ball in the right areas, you were definitely going to get wickets.” – (ST)