Pakistan, true to their status of the dark horse in this cricket world cup has beaten Sri Lanka in the Group A league match. Sri Lanaka played Pakistan in the Premadasa stadium in Colombo in the Day/Night encounter. Pakistan Skipper Shahid Afridi won the toss and elected to bat first. Pakistan had an unchanged team but Sri Lanka had made two changes in the team: Batsman Chamara Silva in for Kapugedera and Left armer Rengana Herath replaced the magic bowler Ajantha Mendis. Lasith Malinga was rested for the match.
Pakistan's batting got to a shaky start losing three quick wickets and then ace batsman Younis Khan and Misbah-ul-Haq steadied the ship. They had a quick 100-run partnership. Both Younis and Misbah reached their fifties. After some last few over burst,Pakistan managed to fighting total of 277/7 in the alloted 50 overs. Sri Lankan bowling was steady and medium pacer Kulasekara and Murali along with Rengana Herath bowled a decent spells. Herath and Perara picked up 2 wickets while Murali finished a economical spell of bowling with one wicket giving away only 35 runs.
Sri Lanka had a positive opening partnership between Tharanga and Dilshan. But in came Hafeez and picked up tharanga for 33 and Dishan was bowled by Afridi. Suddenly, Sri Lanka lost 3 quick wickets with Akhtar showing glimpses of his past performance bowling out Mahela Jayawardena. Sangakarra and Chamara Silva played a calm innings and came up with a good parnership. Sangakarra was picked up by Afridi for 49 and there started the slide for Sri Lanka.
Chamara Silva tried his best but eventually fell for a well made 57 though he consumed a lot of deliveries.
Sri Lanka was able to get only to 265/9 and Pakistan won by 11 runs. This is Sri Lanka's first world cup loss in their country and Pakistan extended their unbeaten streak against Sri Lanka in worl cup's to seven matches in a row.
Pakistan could well be the dark horse team which could go all the way to win this world cup. Lets hope they do it, which could bring some joy to the war-torn country.
