By Srian Obeyesekere

Sri Lanka is expected to make light of the Netherlands in their first warm-up match at the Central Broward Regional Park Stadium Turf Ground in Florida ahead of the ICC T20 World Cup.

Led by the imaginative and attacking all-rounder, Wanindu Hasaranga, the former 2014 champions will be all keyed to get into top fettle for their opening world cup game against South Africa on June 3. Consistency will be the slogan get going slogan for the Lankans, keen to add to their last 3 wins having lost two of their last 5 T20Is.  Hasaranga’s charges packing an exciting brand of stroke makers will be keen to put behind the failure to chase 171 versus Bangladesh after scoring 206 in Sylhet in the 1st T20I of the series.

The Central Broward Regional Park Stadium Turf Ground in Florida, a high-scoring venue should be to the liking of the Lankan batters looking to flex their muscles to the big exchanges on the cards drawn in Group D. Sri Lanka stands in the tall groove of six wins to Netherlands 0 from that number of encounters.

However, the Netherlands will be no pushovers in a progressive build up since then having some experienced T20 players in every department with their key players Max ODowd and Vikramjeet Singh to watch out for.

Sri Lanka Predicted Playing XI:

Pathum Nissanka, Kusal Mendis (wk), Kamindu Mendis, Sadeera Samarawickrama, Charith Asalanka, Angelo Mathews, Dasun Shanaka, Maheesh Theekshana, Wanindu Hasaranga, Matheesha Pathirana, Dilshan Madushanka

Netherlands Predicted Playing XI:

Michael Levitt, Max ODowd, Vikramjit Singh, Scott Edwards (c), Bas de Leede, Wesley Barresi, Logan van Beek, Tim Pringle, Sybrand Engelbrecht, Paul van Meekeren, Vivian Kingma

Meekeran are among the other bowling options in this squad. There is no dearth of bowling options but the batting needs some reliable players who can lead the Dutch campaign in this World Cup.