Mahela Jayawardene to quit T20 internationals after World T20

Mahela Jayawardene

Two of Sri Lanka’s greatest cricketers will retire together from T20 internationals after former skipper Mahela Jayawardene today announced that he will be retiring from the format after the ongoing World T20 at Bangladesh.

The news comes just a day after Kumar Sangakkara announced that the tournament at Bangladesh will be his last in the format.

Jayawardene has played 49 T20 Internationals for Sri Lanka till date. The middle order batsman has scored 1335 runs in those games at an average of 31.78. Jayawardene’s highest score in the format was 100 which came against Zimbabwe in 2010 at the ICC World T20 tournament.

Jayawardene captained Sri Lanka to the finals of the previous edition of the World T20 which took place in Sri Lanka in 2012. The Lankans though were beaten by West Indies in the final. With two of their greatest batsman quitting the format after this year’s tournament, the Lankans will be hoping to give them the perfect send off by doing one better this time around.

BREAKING #SL legend @MahelaJay to join @KumarSanga2 in T20I retirement after the #wt20 2014 pic.twitter.com/HkNbFdcLnr

— ICC (@ICC) March 17, 2014