Pakistan vs Sri Lanka Match Highlights: In the important match of Super-4 of Asia Cup 2023, Sri Lanka has confirmed its place in the final by defeating Pakistan by 2 wickets. According to DLS rules, Sri Lanka had a target of 252 runs in this match, which they achieved in 42 overs. In this victory of the team, Kusal Mendis played an important role with the bat and played a brilliant inning of 91 runs, while Charith Asalanka also scored 49 unbeaten runs. Now the Sri Lankan team will play against India in the title match on 17th September.
In this match, the Sri Lankan team had to score 8 runs in the last over to win, in which only 2 runs were scored in the first 3 balls. Sri Lanka lost its 8th wicket on the fourth ball. Now Sri Lanka had to score 6 runs in the last 2 balls to win. Asalanka hit a four on the fifth ball and took 2 runs on the last ball, leading the team to the finals.
Kusal Perera lost his wicket, Nissanka and Mendis took over the innings.
When the Sri Lankan team came to chase the target in this match, Kusal Perera started scoring runs at a fast pace, but in an attempt to take 1 run at the score of 20, Perera returned to the pavilion after scoring 17 runs. After this, Kusal Mendis, who came to bat, supported Pathum Nissanka very well and did not allow the team to suffer any further setbacks in the first 9 overs. Both the players together took the score to 57 runs.
Nissanka returned to the pavilion, century partnership between Mendis and Samarawickrama
Pathum Nissanka and Kusal Mendis did not let the run pace slow down after the first 9 overs of play were over. Meanwhile, on the score of 77, the Sri Lankan team got the second blow in the form of Pathum Nissanka who became the victim of Shadab Khan on the personal score of 29 runs. After this, Sadira Samarawickrama came on the field to support Kusal Mendis. Together, both of them put pressure on the Pakistani bowlers as well as the fielders and apart from boundaries, they also kept scoring 1 and 2 runs continuously. Due to this, the Sri Lankan team continued moving towards the target.
An excellent 100-run partnership was seen between Sadira Samarawickrama and Kusal Mendis for the third wicket. The Sri Lankan team lost its third wicket in the form of Samarawickrama at the score of 177, who was sent to the pavilion by Iftikhar Ahmed at the personal score of 48.
Kusal Mendis was out at the crucial time, Aslanka won
Kusal Mendis was continuously working from one end to take the Sri Lankan team towards victory, but in the meantime he lost his wicket on a personal score of 91 runs. After this, Sri Lanka lost its 5th wicket in the form of captain Dasun Shanaka at the score of 222. Charith Asalanka controlled the innings from one end and returned after winning on the last ball of the innings. Charith Asalanka played an unbeaten inning of 49 runs in this match. For Pakistan, Iftikhar Ahmed took 3 wickets and Shaheen Afridi took 2 wickets.
Rizwan and Iftikhar showed amazing performance with the bat in Pakistan’s innings.
Pakistan team decided to bat first after winning the toss in this match. The team did not have a good start and on the score of 9 they got their first blow in the form of Fakhar Zaman. After this, captain Babar Azam and Abdullah Shafiq took control of the innings and made a half-century partnership for the second wicket. Vellalaghe made Babar his victim on a personal score of 29. Whereas Shafiq returned to the pavilion after scoring 52 runs. Pakistan team had lost half of its team in this match on the score of 130.
From here, Mohammad Rizwan, along with Iftikhar Ahmed, not only took charge of the innings but also started the process of scoring runs rapidly. The partnership of 108 runs between the two played an important role in taking Pakistan’s score beyond 250. In this match, Rizwan played an unbeaten inning of 86 runs while Iftikhar played an inning of 47 runs. In bowling for Sri Lanka, Mathisha Pathirana took 3 wickets while Pramod Madushan took 2 wickets.
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