Sri Lanka 263/6 on rain hit day
Whatever play was possible as bad weather loomed, during the 18.2 overs consumed the second day of the ICC World Test Championship, the day of course belonged to Sri Lanka’s Dhananjaya de Silva who did everything right against the Pakistan pace bowling attack to get within reach of a magical century at Rawalpindi. When play ended prematurely with Sri Lanka on 263 for 6, the 28-year old lean and lanky de Silva had taken his overnight score of 38 to 72 off 131 balls in a stroke play that further enhanced his growing reputation as the Mr. Reliable of the Sri Lanka batting department; true to the adage, ‘the tough get going when the going gets tough.’
Importantly, the right hander had batted his way in that brief first session to further stamping himself as Sri Lanka’s man for crisis situations. As he has done on several previous occasions, the Debarawewa Central College product installed himself in the two days of the first test thus far as middle order top stock cricket establishment’s long running search for stability to what has been a fickle area in the batting department. Having walked in to a more or less accustomed back to the wall situation after watching Dinesh Chandimal prised out in lethal brutal fashion for 2 with the total a gloomy 127 for 4 wickets, he set about in a calming, but get going repair job piercing the boundary on six occasions on day one showcased by perfect copybook technique.
By yesterday Dhananjaya had transformed the rescue mission before him by infusing his boundary penchant shot making in taking his tally to 11 and looking set to carry on the battle with Pakistan’s pace attack having lost his overnight partner Niroshan Dickwella for 33 with the total on 256 having posted a face saving 67 runs for the sixth wicket. With him was Dilruwan Perera on 2.
CHIEF SCORES:
Sri Lanka 202/5 overnight, 263/6 (86.3 Overs) Run rate: 3.04(D.M. de Silva n.o. 72, N. Dickwella 33, M.D.K. Perera n.o 2, Shaheen Shah Afridi 2/47, Nseem Shah 2/75)
By Srian Obeyesekere
-The opinions expressed here are the views of the writer and do not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of Sri Lanka Cricket-
