Mahela praises youngsters for great fight back
Sa'adi Thawfeeq reporting from England
CRICKET: Sri Lanka captain Mahela Jayawardene was elated the
way his young team had played to hold England to a draw in the first
cricket Test, which ended at Lord's, London on Monday.
"This performance has given a lot of confidence to the youngsters
because that is what they need. Belief in themselves they could do all
this in this level of cricket," said Jayawardene. "Most of them haven't
achieved anything in their careers. This performance will definitely
give them a lot of confidence. I am very happy for them."
Jayawardene was in particular referring to the ninth wicket pair
Chaminda Vaas and Nuwan Kulasekera who put on a record 105 runs to
deprive England of victory. The pair came together with Sri Lanka still
not quite out of the woods at 421-8, a lead of only 61 and continued to
frustrate England for 188 minutes by which time Sri Lanka had insured
them from defeat.
Vaas went onto remain unbeaten on 50, his tenth Test fifty while
young Kulasekera went onto complete his maiden Test half-century scoring
64. "I had a lot of belief in Vaasy and Kulasekera and Dilshan at the
end of he fourth day. They showed a lot of character especially Vaasy.
The experience he's got he showed everything.
He guided Kulasekera throughout the innings and batted really well
with a lot of responsibility. He probably deserves the man of the match
award more than anybody else," said Jayawardene.
Thanks to this pair Sri Lanka staged one of Test cricket's greatest
fight backs to draw the Test. Jayawardene who was top scorer for his
team in both innings with 61 and 119 won the award, but said: "Even
though I won the man of the match I think the whole team deserves it.
They showed a lot of character from top to bottom and batted really well
especially today. It was a brilliant effort from all the guys."
Apart from Jayawardene's and the ninth wicket pair's contribution
there were useful half-centuries from the bats of Upul Tharanga, Kumar
Sangakkara, Farveez Maharoof and Tillakaratne Dilshan, all of which
added immensely towards Sri Lanka's final total of 537-9.
Jayawardene ranked the Test as among the best that he's played in his
79-match career. The two fine innings he played in the Test he said was
important for him. "In the past when I was given responsibility there
were a lot of people saying that it was difficult for me to continue
with my batting and perform at the highest level with the extra
responsibility. I managed to prove a lot of them wrong in this Test,"
said Jayawardene.
"I am not saying it in a bad way but it is something that I have to
come out with because I have been criticised a lot in the last 4-5 years
whenever I was given the responsibility. I don't think my batting has
anything to do with responsibility it is how I go out there and
perform."
Jayawardene rated his second innings hundred as probably among the
best three out of the 14 Test hundreds he's made in his career. "The
conditions were not ideal and the ball was moving around. I was focussed
and I wasn't looking for runs. I wanted to bat out the time and see what
we can achieve at the end of the day. I was disappointed that I wasn't
able to bat today as well. But that's how the game goes," he said.
This century will rank probably among the first three of my 14
hundreds. Jayawardene said that if his team was to win they had to bowl
England out twice.
"We only got five wickets in this Test. There are a lot of areas,
which we need to improve if we are to compete with England. They are
playing really good cricket. We can't win matches by competing only two
days. It is five days and we have to start competing each and every day.
We are looking forward to the next two Test matches," he said.
Jayawardene said although his team benefited immensely by dropped
catches, you could not take anything away from the players who fought
really hard. "Dropped catches are part and parcel of the game. It is
beyond our control. England will be disappointed. Not much went our way
the first three days, but things turned around for us in the last two
days," said Jayawardene.
We can still win the series - Flintoff
Despite the disappointment of not being able to beat Sri Lanka after
making them follow-on 359 runs in arrears and being one-up, England
captain Andrew Flintoff was confident his team could still win the
three-Test series.
"We played some good cricket and we got into some good positions. We
know that the Sri Lankans can fight and they can be competitive. They've
got some talented players in their dressing room. Our confidence hasn't
been dented as a team. We are still expecting to win the series," said
Flintoff. "The way Sri Lanka batted in the first innings it was a false
representation of the pitch.
It is still a very good wicket and they came out and played
themselves in the second innings. We probably couldn't imagine we'd
still be there at five on Monday night, full credit to them. The
difference was if we had held our catches we would have won the game,"
he said. England spilled as many as nine catches, three of them on the
final day when they had to get only four wickets.
"Dropped catches are not an issue. You've seen the lads at practice
you've seen how they work. We have a good catching unit and we have
taken a lot of good catches in the past 2-3 years. It is just one of
those things. I don't think it is a major issue," said Flintoff. "It was
tough not from the catches point of view, but the lads kept going and
going which was a good effort to try and bowl the Sri Lankans out.
As captain I did what I thought was best. "The mood in the dressing
room is great. They enjoy playing cricket for England. Although we
couldn't come out of this game with a win we got a lot of positives.
Some young bowlers have come in and performed on the big stage and the
batters are firing," he said. |