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Muralitharan out for more than six weeks

Chris Dhambarage reporting from Sharjah.

Sharjah.UAE. Wednesday; Sri Lanka suffered a double blow losing the Sharjah Cup 2002 final to Pakistan and their ace spinner Muttiah Muralitharan with a shoulder injury here today.

Sri Lankan skipper Sanath Jayasuriya said that Muralitharan will be out for more than six week's which means that he will also miss the important England tour starting next week. Muralitharan broke down and collapsed while attemting to run out Pakistan batsman Yousuf Yohana in the 11th over of the innings. Muralitharan was taken to the hospital for an X ray and came back to the ground to win the best bowlers award at the prize idstribution.

Muralitharan with 412 test wickets from 73 matches put up a pleasing performance in this tournament and had best figures of 5 wickets for nine runs in the match against New Zealand. Muralitharan is expected to fly to Australia for futher treatment within the next couple of days and will be out of action for more than one month. This is a tremendous setback for the Sri Lankan team who will take up a tough tour England within few days time.

However the Sri Lankan skipper said that the absence of Muralitharan was not the main cause for their defeat but some poor bowling and iresponsible batting led to their downfall. He said that the team performed well to claim four Pakistan wickets for 136 runs but later bowled too many short deliveries and allowed the opposition to dominate the proceedings. Jayasuriya said that this was one match where everything went against them and would like to forget the match as soon as possible.

Jayasuriya said that the defeat would not however effect their preparations for the forthcoming tour of England and are confident despite the absence of Muttiah Muralitharan. He added that the team has been performing well in this tournament although losing the important final by a massive margin of 217 runs. The Lankan came into the final with a better track record in the tournament but failed to deliver the goods when it really matterd. Sri Lanka were bundled out for just 78 runs in just 16.5 overs chasing Pakistan's massive total of 295 for 6.

This was the second time in Sharjah that the Lankans had lost the final to Pakistan after winning both the preliminary round matches. Jayasuriya said that this defeat is not going to affect the side in any way because they had earlier beaten the same opposition twice in the same tournament. Jayasuriya said that the 155 run partnership between man of the match Yousuf Youhana and Younis Khan turned the game in Pakistan's favour.

Sanath Jayasuriya said that Pakistan bowled splendidly and it was a daunting task chasing a total of 295 runs under lights. The Pakistan three prong pace attack comprising of skipper Waqar Younus, Wasim Akram and Shohaib Akhtar played havoc with the Sri Lankan batting while sharing eight wickets between them. In fact Akhtar bowling at a speed of over 150 MPH was in devastating form claiming three wickets for only 11 runs in 4 overs. In addition Wasim Akram had 2 for 33 and skipper Waqar Younus claimed 3 for 33.

Sanath Jayasuriya said that he is completely disappointed with the batting performance especially the manner in which the top order sacrificed their wickets. He also blamed his bowlers for giving the Pakistan batsmen too many opportunities to play their shots. Jayasuriya said that the absence of key bowler Muttiah Muralitharan did not effect the team psycholigically and it was just another bad day for the Sri Lankan team.

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