Mirpur: Sri Lanka are in the finals of the tournament after the rain and hailstorm made the play unable to restart and therefore being called off. They were 27 runs ahead of West Indies at the moment the game stopped which resulted in the victory for Sri Lanka by D/L method.
Though Windies started their chase with a four and six in first over by Smith, but later quick wickets took them down. Chris Gayle who was struggling on the crease made 3 off 13 balls and was the first one to go back to pavalion.
Later Dwayne Smith and Lendl Simmons went in the span of just 6 runs. They made 17 and 4 runs respectively. Dwayne Bravo tried to push up the current run rate by his crucial knock in which he scored 30 off 19 balls including 3X4 and 1X6. He was caught at deep square leg by Jayawardene bowled by Kulasekara.
For Sri Lanka, skipper Lasith Malinga took 2 wickets in 2 overs giving away 5 runs. Seekkuge Prasanna and Nuwan Kulasekara took 1 wicket each. Rangana Herath who surprised by his bowling against New Zealand proved to be costly here. In his 4 overs he gave 27 runs and got no wicket.
Earlier, Thirimanne , Mathews and Dilshan put up a brave fight to post a total of 160/6 in 20 overs against West Indies in the first semi final of World T20 here Thursday.
Choosing to bat first after winning the toss openers Perera and Dilshan gave their team a fine fine start by putting on 41 runs for the first wicket.
First to go was Perera who was bowled by Santokie. He faced 12 balls for his 26 runs which include two fours and two sixes.
Sri Lanka were in deep trouble as they lost two wickets in quick succession. Jayawardene was run out without facing a ball and than Sangakkara gave a return catch to Badree with scoreboard reading 49.
Thirimanne first with Dilshan and than with Mathews not only repaired the damage but also helped put on a challenging total.
Thirimanne was the highest scorer with 44 followed by Mathews (40). Dilshan made 39.
For West Indies Santokie took 2 wickets for 46 and Badree took one for 23
In their bid to reach their second successive World T20 final, defending champions West Indies will be looking to put up another clinical performance when they take on a gutsy Sri Lanka, who in turn would be hoping to avenge their loss in the last edition's summit clash.
One can expect a good encounter as both teams have a lot in common going into the big semi-final clash here tomorrow.
Both Sri Lanka and West Indies have had identical victories in their final group league encounters in which they had crushed their respective opponents for paltry scores of less than 100 runs.
Both the sides boast of world class spinners, who are winning games on a consistent basis. While Rangana Herath would want to repeat his Chittagong heroics with another superlative effort against the Gayles and the Bravos, the Jayawardenes and the Sangakkaras will be equally wary of the threats that will be posed by Messrs Sunil Narine and Samuel Badree.
Teams from:
Sri Lanka: MDKJ Perera, TM Dilshan, DPMD Jayawardene, KC Sangakkara, AD Mathews, HDRL Thirimanne, S Prasanna, KMDN Kulasekara, SMSM Senanayake, HMRKB Herath, SL Malinga
West Indies: DR Smith, CH Gayle, MN Samuels, LMP Simmons, DJ Bravo, D Ramdin, DJG Sammy, AD Russell, SP Narine, S Badree, K Santokie
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