Zimbabwe – 154 all out in 41.3 overs (Peter Moor 47, Graeme Cremer 31*; Asela Gunaratne 3/21, Suranga Lakmal 2/19, Nuwan Pradeep 2/21, Nuwan Kulasekara 2/23)
Sri Lanka – 155 for 2 in 24.3 overs (Dhananjaya de Silva 78*, Niroshan Dickwella 41; Chamunorwa Chibhabha 1/18, Tinashe Panyangara 1/37)
Peter Moor, with a fighting innings of 47, was probably the only Zimbabwe player who will want to remember anything about the opening match of the Blue Mountain Achilleion Cup, in which Sri Lanka virtually walked over the hosts by eight wickets at Harare Sports Club.The majority of the Zimbabwe batsmen were seemingly spooked by being put in to bat in what they expected to be lethal conditions for batting, and only Moor was able to put together a good score and carry the attack back to the tourists.
Set a simple target, the Sri Lanka batsmen ran home with more than 25 overs to spare, treating the Zimbabwe bowlers much as they pleased.Zimbabwe dropped Hamilton Masakadza, with Tino Mawoyo, Malcolm Waller and Chris Mpofu also being omitted – in their places were Carl Mumba, making his ODI début, Chamu Chibhabha, Sikandar Raza and Tinashe Panyangara, returning after injury.
For Sri Lanka, Asela Gunaratne made his ODI début, while four other changes were made to their Test team.Rangana Herath has retired from one-day cricket, so Upul Tharanga captained the side.
It was a good all-round bowling performance by Sri Lanka. Gunaratne removed the last three batsmen, and Kulasekara, Lakmal and Pradeep each took two cheap wickets.Only the spinners Pathirana and Jayasuriya proved expensive.There was almost a sensational start to the Sri Lanka innings.De Silva scored most of the early runs, as he faced most of the bowling, but before long his partner Kusal Perera began to get into his stride.
The fifty came up in the ninth over as Panyangara seemed to tire after his long layoff.
It took a brilliant catch by Raza on the square-leg boundary to break the stand, as Perera pulled a long hop from Chibhabha fiercely, but Raza ran, dived and picked it up just above the ground at full length.Perera had made 21 and Sri Lanka were 56 for one.
Niroshan Dickwella, Sri Lanka’s wicketkeeper in this match, came in next, but the scoring rate did not slow downDe Silva on 41 gave a sharp return chance to Chibhabha, and the cover fielder added to the pain with a needless wild throw-in that gave away two overthrows.
Nine runs off the over brought de Silva his fifty off 47 balls. The hundred came up in the 16th over.Panyangara returned, but not even he could stem the flood of runs.
He did manage to take the wicket of Dickwella, who tried one extravagant stroke too many and skied a catch to third man for 41 off 38 balls.But Sri Lanka were then 140 for two wickets, with only 15 more runs needed.Kusal Mendis pulled a short ball from Cremer for six, and finally de Silva hit the winning runs, a miscued drive off Panyangara that eventually went for four.
Sri Lanka won by eight wickets in the 25th over, having used up less than half their ration.
De Silva finished with 78 not out off 75 balls, and Mendis 12 off eight.Zimbabwe obviously have plenty of work to do before their next match in Bulawayo, especially regarding mental preparation when conditions are not what they would wish.
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