Related Links : ICC Champions Trophy 2006 : Scorecard
Lankan lions won the opening game of this edition of the Champions Trophy at Mohali by comprehensively beating minnows Bangladesh by 37 runs. The victory margin may not be too huge but Bangladesh were never in the race chasing Sri Lanka’s 302. It was the 21-year-old Upul Tharanga who was instrumental in Sri Lanka’s win today as he notched up his 5th ODI hundred playing just his 30th match which also saw him get the Man of the Match award. Sri Lankans have shown that they have the strength in batting and bowling along with their electric fielding to be one of the hot favourites to win the Trophy. This of course is just the preliminary round where two of the four teams – Sri Lanka, West Indies, Bangladesh and Zimbabwe make it to the main draw.
The pitch for the day had grass on it and it was a dream wicket for the pacers as there was all the pace and extra bounce that they could extract. The coin had rolled in Habibul Bashar’s favour and he opted to take the field as his bowling attack mainly comprised of slow bowlers who would have found it tough to grip the ball in the second half once the dew takes its toll. For Sri Lanka, Marvan Atapattu found a place in the side after a long lay off from a serious back injury. He was kept in the middle order with Sri Lanka sticking to the pair of Tharanga and Jayasuriya to open. It was a cautious start from the two lefties as they spent some time gauging the wicket conditions before launching into the inexperienced Bangladeshi bowlers.
Sri Lanka were going along steadily at 67 for no loss in the 14th over when they had lost Sanath Jayasuriya trapped in front of the stumps by a late inswinger from left armer Syed Rasel. By then Jayasuriya had got 31 from 46 balls with five hits to the ropes. Skipper Mahela Jayawardene was the no.3 and he meant business right from the beginning of his innings as he made good use of the Powerplay blocks along with Tharanga. Mahela Jayawardene was looking ominous but his innings was cut short by a full blooded sweep off Razzak that went straight to the short mid wicket fielder. The Lankan skipper had raced away to a 24-ball 35 which had 6 fours and a six over fine leg. Sri Lankans had the perfect platform at 130 for 2 after 22 overs. Upul Tharanga and Kumar Sangakkara (22) built around a useful partnership of 63 before the latter had chipped Rafique straight to long on. The new man in was Atapattu and he got going soon by picking up the spots where he could get the boundaries.
Upul Tharanga went past his 5th hundred and this was out of eight scores of fifty plus in his short career. He was finally dismissed after failing to connect a slog off Mortaza but by then had scored 105 from 129 balls with 11 fours and a six. Atapattu soon followed him after making almost a run-a-ball 40 with 7 boundaries. With some good lusty hitting towards the end, Sri Lanka finished at 302 for 8 with Dilshan unbeaten on 26. The two Bangladeshi left arm spinners Rafique (10-037-1) and Razzak (10-0-49-2) were decent enough to put the brakes on the scoring.
Bangladesh opened up with two of its most promising batsmen in Shahriar Nafees and Mohammad Ashraful who were tied down by accurate new ball bowling from Vaas and Malinga. Nafees soon gave away edging Vaas to a diving Sangakkara after scratching around for 22 balls making just 5. Ashraful who was slow as well was caught down the legstump by Sangakkara off Maharoof after making 18 from 43 balls. Aftab Ahmed, the no.3 entertained a while with his glorious flicks which also included a six over square leg off the pacy Dilhara Fernando. But Aftab’s innings of 33 from 31 balls was nothing more than a cameo and he was bounced out by Maharoof who got the ball to climb up awkwardly to induce a top edge in Aftab’s hook. Two balls later, Maharoof had forced Habibul Bashar to fend his rising delivery into the slips without any addition of the score which was now 78 for 4 in the 19th over.
There was a sparkling partnership that followed between the left handed Saqibul Hasan and Farhad Reza that gave some reason to watch the otherwise one-sided affair. Farhad Reza had come along as a breath of fresh air and he does look to be an exciting talent. Farhad’s innings was also a short one like Aftab’s and he was stumped off Murali after making 34. The rest of the match was just a formality to be done and the stubborn Saqibul dragged the match till the very end and all Bangladesh achieved was that of batting out their entire overs without getting bowled out. They had ended up at 265 for 9 with Saqibul unbeaten on 69 from 107 deliveries.
Farveez Maharoof had taken three wickets and he along with Dilhara Fernando looked extremely dangerous in exploiting the hard nature of this Mohali wicket. Both bowlers got plenty of lift but they were often erratic in their direction in particular Dilhara Fernando. Sri Lanka had given away 34 extra runs out of which were 21 wides! The opening bowlers Chaminda Vaas and Lasith Malinga were economical compared to these two bowlers. Muralitharan and Jayasuriya had just got through their overs without much impact on the batsmen as they couldn’t grip the ball properly as it got wet every time it ran across the outfield.