‘Entire batting unit must take blame for defeat’

• Janith Liyanage says “We should have been able to chase the total down”

The start of the Sri Lankan collapse – Tanvir Islam celebrates dismissing Nishan Madushka

Janith Liyanage tried his best to get Sri Lanka across the line

A game that Sri Lanka should have won, they lost (by 16 runs) – and instead of going to Pallekele for the third and final ODI with the series under their belt, they now face the challenge of having to battle it out with Bangladesh to try and win it.

The loss gave Bangladesh, who had lost the Test series and the first ODI, some relief and belief that they can turn the tables on the host country in this white-ball format. From their point of view, it was a remarkable comeback from their batting debacle in the first ODI, where they lost seven wickets for five runs to beat a team that was brimming with confidence.

Janith Liyanage, who tried to win the game for Sri Lanka on his own, but failed, blamed the defeat squarely on the batsmen. 

“We know that the R. Premadasa pitch turns a bit as the game goes on, but we’re not using that as an excuse. This is a game we should have won. We made some small mistakes and lost the game,” said Liyanage at the post-match conference.

“We should have been able to chase the total down. The entire fault the batting unit must take. We will look forward to winning the next match through the batting unit.”

Liyanage, who played a plucky knock of 78 off 85 balls, said: “When I was in the middle, I thought Sri Lanka always had a chance. I was telling my partners that if we can take it deep, we can win the game. Unfortunately we couldn’t. Dushmantha [Chameera] was giving me incredible support at the time. If I’d stayed there, we would definitely have been able to win. Dushy aiya was fantastic. I was the one who made the mistake.”

Liyanage said that they had talked with coaches about what to do in different kinds of situations and one thing they had said was if the top order batsmen were dismissed, it was he who had to take on the responsibility. 

“I thought if I stayed till the end in the way the coaches had taught me, we had a chance. We definitely practice batting in different situations, and different phases. With that coaching, we’ve come to a more stable place than we were before. We need to take more responsibility as a team than we did today.”

Left-arm spinner Tanvir Islam, who had the Sri Lankan batsmen at sixes and sevens with his drift and turn, went onto claim his maiden five-wicket haul in ODIs, playing only his second match. He made his ODI debut in the first match of the current series with figures of 1/44 off 10 overs but made a resounding statement in the second.

After a shaky start conceding 22 runs in his first two overs, Tanvir began his demolishing of the Lankan batting by breaking the threatening partnership of 67 between Nishan Madushka and Kusal Mendis. He benefitted a lot from the control provided by his Captain Mehidy Hasan and part-time off-spinner Shamim Hossain, who collectively conceded only 59 runs from their 19 overs and picked up a wicket apiece. Their tight spells gave Tanvir the freedom to attack and hunt for wickets – a liberty he fully capitalised on.

An area of concern for Sri Lanka is the number of dot balls they played down, thus allowing the bowlers to tighten their lines and lengths. Of the 297 balls they faced in their innings, Sri Lanka played down 174 dot balls.

“Yes, we definitely talked about dot balls in team meetings. But we know that on the Premadasa pitch, it’s not easy to bat, so we tried to minimise the risk. We’ll talk a little more about the dot balls in the future,” said Liyanage.

Sri Lanka’s loss came despite a blazing 53 off 31 balls by Kusal Mendis, who had reached his 50 off 20 balls – the fastest made by anyone at this venue and the fourth fastest ever by a Sri Lankan batsman, and seam bowler Asitha Fernando’s career best return of 4/35.

The win was Bangladesh’s first in ODIs at the R. Premadasa Stadium.