Super Eight's start with super over finish
The Super8’s began in a superb manner, providing the first close match of the tournament. It was one of the best matches in World T20s and one which will remain in the memories of cricket fans all around the world.
Team news:
New Zealand made just one change to their line up that lost to Pakistan. They replaced Adam Milne with Martin Guptill who was unfit for the previous match.
Their line up was: Martin Guptill, Rob Nicol, McCullum, Ross Taylor, Jacob Oram , James Franklin, Williamson, Nathan Mccullum, Tim Southee, Daniel Vettori and Kyle Mills.
Sri Lanka made a couple of changes bringing back Ajantha Mendis, who according to his captain was 90% fit, and they also decided to unleash their mystery spinner Dhananjaya and dropped their rookie opener for him.
Toss:
The toss was won by NZ and they expectedly decided to bat first on a pitch where the team batting first had won 5 of the six matches played there. Also, SL had not won single match chasing at home.
NZ innings:
NZ began their innings sedately as they watchfully played out the first few overs. They tried to get their eye in as they did not score much of the first few overs. Then Guptill got into his rhythm and started playing his usual shots, clearing the inner field with relative ease. Malinga did not start off very well as he leaked runs, giving balls on the pads which were easily scored off. Nicol, at the other end, was struggling as he was unable to gauge the pace of the pitch and was continuously mistiming his shots. In came Mendis into the attack and the NZ team was trying to attack him from the go and that they did by scoring a couple of boundaries of his very first over.
As soon as the powerplay overs finished, SL unleashed their newest mystery spinner Dhananjaya and they reaped immediate rewards as Guptill mistimed a lofted drive to long off. No one was able to read him in his first over as he had a bag of tricks up his sleeve. As soon as he came for his 2nd over, McCullum decided to attack him and started to take risks and this paid rich dividends as he was able to score some quick runs. Slowly at the other end, Nicol was gathering pace and started playing well and he even carted Mendis for three sixes in an over and he was making up for a slow start. Ross Taylor also gave some impetus by playing a decent knock of 24 runs. But no one exploded in the final overs and NZ only reached an above par score rather than a winning total. They scored 174 runs and it was probably ten short after the way they played the middle overs .
McCullum lead NZ to a competitive total of 174
SL innings:
SL innings began with a bang as they scored 17 runs off the very first over. It was probably a mistake on the part of the NZ team to begin with spin and SL were off in their chase. This gave them confidence to attack even the pacers and Dilshan and Jayawardene were marauding the bowlers all around the park, giving the SL team a perfect start. They scored 68 runs in the first six overs and absolutely blunted the attack with some wonderful strokeplay. NZ, as usual, were not going to give up and they took wickets to slow down the run rate. They took the wickets of Jayawardene, Sanga and Mendis to stay in the match keeping their hopes alive. SL needed 42 runs off 30 balls and it certainly looked to be their match as Dilshan was still there at the crease, timing the ball beautifully. But tight overs from Vettori and Franklin and some poor batting by the middle order meant that the pressure mounted the SL team and 21 runs were required of 12 balls. Dilshan hit the 1st ball for a six and it seemed enough but he got out the very next ball. Perrera too scored a boundary and got out as 8 were required off six.
And it looked pretty simple but yet the SL batsmen almost messed it up and they required 5 off 2 but a timely boundary meant they required 1 off the last ball but Thirimanne got run out and it was a tie. This was a fair result as the match see sawed between the two teams and finally the scores were even.
Dilshan played a superb knock to take SL almost to victory
The super over started with SL batting first and Jayawardene and Perrera came out to bat and with two’s and three’s and some wide balls, the SL team reached a total off 13 runs. NZ would have been disappointed with the wides they bowled. When they batted, Guptill and McCullum came in and Malinga bowled superbly and the batsmen were unable to get the boundaries and when Guptill connected one, he holed out to Dilshan at the boundary to a good catch and the match was over there as SL held their nerve to win the match. Both teams will look to improve their performance in the next match and would like to close the match when they are ahead.