Sports Desk/

The incident happened at the beginning of the T20 World Cup. Asia’s champion Sri Lanka has been crushed by Namibia. Sri Lanka lost by 55 runs in the first match of the qualifying round. Batting first, Namibia’s total was 163 for 7 wickets. In reply, the Lankans scored a total of 108 runs, losing all their wickets.

After winning the toss and bowling, the Shanaka team made a great start. The Lankan bowlers pushed Namibia’s two openers back for 16 runs. However, captain Erasmus made a pair of 41 runs with Stephen Bird. De Silva returned Erasmus for the team’s 76 runs. Shortly thereafter, Stephen Bird departed.

However, Jan Frylink and JJ Schmitt made a pair of 70 runs. These two batsmen floated the Lankan bowlers for four and six. Frylink scored 44 runs off 28 balls for the team. He hit four fours in this innings. Besides, Schmidt was unbeaten at the end of the innings with 31 runs off 16 balls. Among the Lankans, Pramod Madushan got two wickets.

Sri Lanka managed 57 runs in the last four overs. They gave their second highest runs in the death overs in the World Cup. And Freilink and Smit’s 70 is the third highest for a seventh or subsequent wicket pair.

Sri Lanka lost wickets at regular intervals chasing runs. David Wiese got Sri Lanka’s first wicket in the second over. Kushal Mendis returned with a personal 6 runs. Ben Shikongo’s ball in the fourth over upset the Lankan batting line. Pathum Nishanka catches JJ Smit. On the very next ball, Danushka Gunathilaka hit a golden duck caught by Green. Shikongo could have got a wicket in the next ball too, but he was not successful with the review.

After losing three wickets for 21 runs, the Dhananjaya-Rajapaksa duo was handling the pressure. However, Dhananjaya returned to the team for 40 runs and Freilink caught the Lankan camp.

Then Bhanuka Rajapakse and captain Dasun Shanaka continued to pull the team. But this pair could not survive the bowling ball of Namibia. After Rajapaksa, Hasaranga, Karunaratnera started returning to Sajghar one by one. Captain Shanaka also failed to win the team. He got out with a team-high 29 runs. In the end, the Lankans’ innings stopped at 108 runs. David Wiese, Scholtz and Shikongo took two wickets each for Namibia.