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| Monday, 17 May 2004 |
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Lanka heading for huge win in second Test Sa'adi Thawfeeq reporting from Zimbabwe BULAWAYO, Sunday , Sri Lanka already one-up in the two-Test series was heading for a huge win over Zimbabwe in the second cricket Test after piling up their second highest total in Test cricket at the Queens Sports Club grounds here today. Sri Lanka declared their first innings closed at an imposing 713 for three wickets shortly after Mahela Jayawardene had completed his 11th Test hundred to join his captain Marvan Atapattu and Kumar Sangakkara who both made career best scores. Atapattu scored 249 improving on his previous highest of 223 against Zimbabwe at Kandy in 1997-98, and Sangakkara went past his only previous double century of his career - 230 against Pakistan at Lahore in 2001-02. The total was only Sri Lanka's second highest to their world record of 952-6 against India at the R. Premadasa Stadium in 1997-98 and the ninth highest in the all-time list. It also erased Sri Lanka's previous highest total against Zimbabwe, which was 586-6 declared at the SSC in 2001-02. Zimbabwe who scored 228 runs trailed Sri Lanka on the first innings by a massive 485 runs. The only way out for them was to bat out the remaining two days. But by the close they had already lost two wickets for 44 runs and face an enormous task in trying to save the Test and the series with two more days remaining. Nuwan Zoysa struck two crippling blows to Zimbabwe in their second innings when he dismissed Stuart Matsikenyeri (14) and Mark Vermeulen (6) to end the day with figures of two for 12 off eight overs. The sparse crowd urged Jayawardene to go to his hundred before the tea break, but he was not to be hurried as Sri Lanka kept on piling on the runs relentlessly. Jayawardene eventually got there in the third over after resumption completing his century in 175 minutes off 152 balls with seven fours and one six. A coloured spectator fed up with the beating the Zimbabwe bowlers were getting at the hands of the Sri Lankan batsmen started waving a white T-shirt from the stands asking them to declare and bring the agony to an end. A section of spectators also started chanting in chorus 'Declare Atapattu' over and over again. Long wait for breakthrough Zimbabwe had to wait for exactly a day's play before they could break the second wicket liaison between Atapattu and Sangakkara, which realized 438 runs in 388 minutes and 548 balls. It was the sixth highest partnership of all-time list (see table below). What was so pleasing about the partnership was that despite the flurry of boundaries that came their way, both batsmen still pushed for the ones and twos showing the urgency with which they wanted to score the runs. Atapattu, who was missed three times yesterday after 150, finally fell for 249 when he edged a wide delivery from part time bowler Chigumbura to wicket-keeper Taibu. It brought to an end a marathon stay of 516 minutes during which time he faced 324 balls and reached the boundary on 36 occasions and once over it. It was Atapattu's 14th Test century and his sixth over the double-century mark. Sangakkara starting the day at 186 completed his second double century of his 38-Test career in the fifth over of the morning. He got there in 331 minutes off 264 balls with the aid of 29 fours and two sixes. At 208 he was missed for the second time in his innings off the luckless Nkala who saw him put down on this occasion at deep third man by Matsikenyeri. Sangakkara was earlier missed at nought off the third ball he faced yesterday. By lunch Sangakkara had passed his previous highest Test score of 230 against Pakistan at Lahore in 2001-02 by reaching 250 which came up in 432 minutes off 336 balls with 35 fours and two sixes. Sangakkara broke the ground record of David Houghton who made 266 against Sri Lanka here in 1994-95 and then went past Aravinda de Silva's 267 which was until today the second highest individual score in a Test by a Sri Lankan after Sanath Jayasuriya's 340 against India at the R. Premadasa Stadium in 1997-98. He was eventually dismissed for 270 getting a thick outside edge to Taibu off Panyangara, after batting for 468 minutes and facing 365 balls. He hit 36 fours and two sixes. It was the highest score made by any batsman from either side in the series between the two countries, which has seen 15 Tests being played since the first in 1994-95. Zimbabwe provided perhaps the first instance in Test cricket where six bowlers went for over one hundred runs in an innings. ZIMBABWE 1ST INNINGS 228 SRI LANKA 1ST INNINGS (overnight 443-1) M.Atapattu c Taibu b Chigumbura 249 S.Jayasuriya c Taibu b Nkala 48 K.Sangakkara c Taibu b Panyangara 270 M.Jayawardene not out 100 T.Samaraweera not out 32 EXTRAS (lb-5 nb-5 w-4) 14 TOTAL (for three wickets declared, 165.3 overs) 713 FALL OF WICKETS: 1-100 2-538 3-627. Did not bat: T.Dilshan, P.Jayawardene, C.Vaas, N.Zoysa, M. Muralitharan, F.Maharoof. BOWLING: Hondo 29-5-116-0 (nb-3), Panyangara 25-4-120-1 (nb-1, w-1), Mupariwa 34-1-136-0 (nb-1), Nkala 32-3-111-1 (w-1), Chigumbura 21-2-108-1 (w-2), Matsikenyeri 23.3-1-112-0, Vermeulen 1-0-5-0. ZIMBABWE 2ND INNINGS S.Matsikenyeri c P.Jayawardene b Zoysa 14 B.Taylor not out 19 M.Vermeulen c Muralitharan b Zoysa 6 D.Ebrahim not out 3 EXTRAS (lb-2) 2 TOTAL (for two wickets, 25 overs) 44 FALL OF WICKETS: 1-22 2-40. Bowling: Vaas 8-4-10-0, Zoysa 8-2-12-2, Muralitharan 9-2-20-0. To bat: T.Taibu, A.Maregwede, E.Chigumbura, T.Mupariwa, M.Nkala, D.Hondo, T.Panyangara |
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