Colombo: Ahead of Sri Lanka’s departure to Australia for the Men’s T20 World Cup, captain Dasun Shanaka stated that his side has got all the attributes to emerge victorious in the showpiece event if the right decisions are taken and plans made by them are executed on the given day.
Sri Lanka had to go through first round to enter Super 12 stage in the T20 World Cup last year. Despite not making it to the semi-finals, they did show signs of a side trying to be better in the format. The 2014 champions enter the tournament in Australia as winners of Asia Cup 2022 in the UAE.
“If we make the right decisions on the day and execute our plans, I’m certain we can come out victorious. The confidence level is definitely higher (than at the last World Cup), but my concern has always been the process. Even at the last World Cup, I felt we had the talent to at least make the semifinals. The important thing is your ability to play and deliver on the day,” Shanaka was quoted as saying by ESPNCricinfo.
Before opening their T20 World Cup campaign in the first-round match against Namibia on October 16, Sri Lanka will be playing practice matches against Zimbabwe and Ireland on October 10 and 13 respectively. Prior to leaving for Australia, Sri Lanka had an skills-intensive training camp in Kandy in last week of September.
Head coach Chris Silverwood explained how he plans to use the time in going early to Australia to help the squad in adjusting to Sri Lankan conditions. “With the bowling we’re still working on yorkers, to make sure we can be successful on Australian wickets, to make sure we have the skills to back our plans up.”
“We have a couple of warm-up games before the Namibia game. We’ll play match scenarios amongst ourselves before that to make sure we can control the environment that we’re training in.”
“We’re actually very specific about what we’re trying to train. For example, we did a Super Over up in Kandy, which is all in good fun, but it highlights where it can be a bit chaotic in the Super Over. It happens very quickly, and we have to make sure we keep a level head.”
“Then the dimensions of the grounds in Australia — they have some big grounds — we’ll have to learn to cope with them. We have to make sure we get the distance right off the boundary to cut the angles down and get the guys used to doing that.”
–IANS