ICC Women’s World Cup 2017, England vs Sri Lanka: 5 Talking Points
England Women cruised on to a comfortable victory over Sri Lanka women by 7 wickets at Taunton riding on a four-wicket haul from Laura Marsh and fifties from Sarah Taylor and Heather Knight. Batting first, Sri Lanka kept losing wickets at regular intervals and could only crawl their way to a paltry 204/8 in their 50 overs.
Opener Hasini Perera was the top-scorer with 46 (63) while tail-ender Ama Kanchana also impressed with a cameo of 34*. Laura Marsh was the pick of the English bowlers with figures of 4/45 in her 10 overs.
Chasing the total, England got off to a bitter-sweet start having lost both of their openers for 50 runs inside 8 overs. However, Sarah Taylor and Heather Knight ensured that England romp home with a comfortable victory as both of them scored superb half-centuries.
Marsh was adjudged the ‘Player of the Match’ for her superb bowling spell. England ultimately won the match by 7 wickets and continued their superb run of form. Let us now have a look at the five talking points from the match.
#1 Sri Lanka losing wickets in clusters
Sri Lanka got off to a steady start as their openers, Nipuni Hansika and Hasini Perera, stitched together a partnership of 44 runs for the first wicket. However, they soon found themselves in troubled waters as they lost both their openers in quick succession.
First, Natalie Sciver brought an end to Hansika’s troubled stay at the crease in the 13th over as she was dismissed for a mere 17 runs off 40 deliveries. Then she struck back again dismissing Last match’s centurion, Chamari Atapattu.
Thus, Sri Lanka lost two wickets for just 7 runs and the fall of Atapattu’s wicket brought Shashikala Siriwardene to the crease who steadied the Lankan ship for a while along with Perera.
The period afterwards was followed by a couple of 30-odd runs stands for the third and fourth wickets as Sri Lanka cruised along to a score of 118/4.However, they lost the wickets of Harshitha Madhavi (1) and Dilani Manodara (28) in successive overs to be reduced to 130/6.
Their backbone was ruptured broken and it was ultimately up to the Lankan tail to stretch the score to a fighting total.