Sri Lanka clinched their first home series against Pakistan after the temperamental tourists suffered a spectacular collapse in the second Test yesterday.
Pakistan, sitting pretty at 285-1 just before lunch on the third day, crashed to 320 all out after the break to leave Sri Lanka a victory target of 171 for a decisive 2-0 lead in the three-match series.
Sri Lanka cruised home by seven wickets with two days to spare, skipper Kumar Sangakkara leading the way with a fluent 46 after opener Malinda Warnapura made 54.
PHOTO: AFP
Pakistan’s surrender against the second new ball came after debutant opener Fawad Alam hit a superb 168 and shared a record stand of 200 for the second wicket with skipper Younus Khan (82).
The partnership was Pakistan’s highest for the second wicket against Sri Lanka, surpassing the 151 by Mohsin Khan and Majid Khan at Lahore in 1982.
Alam batted for more than six hours to amass the highest score by a Pakistani batsman on Sri Lankan soil, surpassing the 151 by Salim Malik at the Sinhalese Sports Club in Colombo in 1997.
But Pakistan lost their last nine wickets for 35 runs, their third successive collapse in the series that highlighted their reputation as one of the most unpredictable sides in modern cricket.
Pakistan had seen eight wickets fall for 46 runs on the fourth morning of the Galle Test when just 97 more were needed to win the match.
The tourists then crumbled for a paltry 90 in 36 overs on the first day of this Test after electing to bat on a wicket that provided assistance to the seam bowlers.
Sri Lanka did not feel the absence of star spinner Muttiah Muralitharan, out of action with a knee injury, as left-arm slow bowler Rangana Herath claimed 5-99 and seamer Nuwan Kulasekera took 4-37.
Skipper Younus himself triggered the collapse just before lunch when he gifted his wicket, top-edging an ambitious reverse sweep off part-time spinner Tharanga Paranavitana to the wicket-keeper.
Sangakkara’s gamble to hand the new ball to spinner Herath, man of the match at Galle, paid off handsomely.
Herath trapped veteran Mohammad Yousuf leg-before with his second delivery as the batsman missed the line of a straight ball after making six.
Kulasekera had Misbah-ul Haq leg-before for three before Herath ended Alam’s long vigil at the crease by having him edging a catch to Warnapura at short-leg.
Kulasekera caught Kamran Akmal plumb in front of the wicket and Herath bowled Shoaib Malik after the former Pakistan captain had smashed the previous delivery for a six.
The last three batsmen were leg-before in quick succession.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier