You win some, you lose some is a famous idiom that is used by sports teams to indicate that it’s not possible to win all the time.
That would aptly apply to Sri Lanka when Bangladesh pulled off a stunning five-wicket win chasing down what looked like a match winning total of 215 on Saturday to throw wide open the Hero Nidahas Tri-nation T20I series.
Sri Lanka looked to be well in the driver’s seat when they racked up an imposing score of 214-6 ala brilliant half-centuries from the two Kusals - Mendis and Perera. But Bangladesh who put up a rather below par performance against India in their opening match of the series, suddenly switched gears to make the impossible possible and chase down Sri Lanka’s total with a well planned counter attack that exposed the home team’s deficiencies bowling on a flat wicket.
Although Sri Lanka will be disappointed to be on the losing side after posting such a big score the fans certainly got their money’s worth of entertainment as the 40 overs in the match produced a handsome 429 runs.
What that win has done to the tri-series is that after the first round robin matches all three teams have a one win-one loss record going into today’s second round where Sri Lanka meets India at the R Premadasa Stadium.
“It was a good game of cricket. We put up a very good total, but it was actually too good a wicket for the batters. As a bowling unit I think we were below par and we didn’t execute our plans well,” said Sri Lanka skipper Dinesh Chandimal reflecting on his teams’ loss.
“We can’t win every day. As a team we’re just thinking about how to play the best we can at all times. And when we do that we will win more often than not. Today’s (Saturday) loss, I think we played well, but Bangladesh just played that little bit better. We had some things up our sleeves. But they fought very hard, and we didn’t execute our plans to our liking. That is what cost us the match,” he said.
Commenting on his own team’s performance and on Mushfiqur’s match-winning knock, Chandimal said, “It was a really good total, but these things happen in cricket. Even if you score 200 plus you can’t just assume that you’re going to win. Any team with any total, you need to get early wickets when defending. That’s what we were hoping to do, but were unable to pull it off. As a bowling unit we didn’t get that breakthrough early on.
“Cricket is a funny game and things can change. Credit goes to them they played some great cricket and handled the situation really well. We all know that Bangladesh have played some outstanding cricket in the recent past. This was one of the best Mushfiqur innings I have seen,” he said.
Chandimal stated that in a series of this nature every game was crucial. “We have some game plans against India, but we need to execute those in the middle.”
As for Bangladesh their experienced opener Tamim Iqbal said the win would definitely give them a lot of confidence. “It is one of our best wins but I am a big believer in the fact that we haven’t conquered everything by just one win. It has given us confidence of chasing 215 runs. It is not the end, but just the start. We really needed this as a team.”
Where Bangladesh surprised Sri Lanka was when they promoted Liton Das to open the batting with Tamim and he obliged by smashing 43 off only 19 balls to set the tone for the rest of the innings.
“We knew that they would start off with off-spin. That was one of the reasons we promoted Liton to the top of the order. That plan worked for us and it didn’t work for them,” said Tamim. Akila Dananjaya’s three overs cost 36 runs without a wicket.
“We might not have big power hitters but we can plan and play a Bangladeshi brand of T20 cricket,” said Tamim. “We can’t follow England or West Indies because we have different kind of players. We don’t have someone like MS Dhoni to come at No 7. We don’t have a Chris Gayle to take on the bowlers from the first ball. I think we have smart cricketers, who are different. It is not about hitting sixes and fours all the time. In the middle overs we saw that by taking a lot of singles. Boundaries will come.”
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