Image Credit- AFP
Though Sri Lanka’s disastrous World Cup campaign ended
just three months ago, head coach Chris Silverwood believes things are already
improving after his team’s performances thus far, especially in the previous
two One-Day Internationals against Afghanistan.
With the bats heaping up runs on pitches flatter than
those typically seen in Sri Lanka, Sri Lanka won both matches by 42 and 155
runs, respectively. Like Charith Asalanka two days before, Silverwood was happy
that SLC had heeded his advice to cultivate flatter pitches.
“If we just look at 50-over cricket for the
moment, our game plan is better suited to good wickets,” Silverwood said
on the eve of the third ODI against Afghanistan. “I asked for flat wickets
and thankfully I got the support in that from the powers that be.”
“For how we want to play our cricket, the nature
of how we want to play it, then we need good wickets to do that. And to also
allow players the opportunity to galvanise that game plan through the fact that
you can go out and do it time and time again. Slow, low wickets don’t suit us
to do that.
“For me the wickets have been excellent here [in
Pallekele]. Yes, we’ve seen lots of runs, but that’s what we want. We need to
be able to put up those big scores and then we need to be able to defend
them.”
Regarding containing those huge totals, Afghanistan
came close to catching up to Sri Lanka in the opening game, but ultimately fell
short after a fierce chase. Sri Lanka amassed a massive 381. However, Sri
Lanka’s bowlers made it considerably harder for Afghanistan in the second game
with 308 defend, which finally led to a spectacular collapse where the visitors
lost their final eight wickets for only 25 runs.
This was a particularly pleasing accomplishment for
Silverwood because the players actively assimilated and applied the coaching
staff’s recommendations.
“After the first game I thought there was plenty
of room for improvement,” Silverwood said. “So we sat the lads down –
all of them, not just the bowlers – and we showed them using the Hawk-Eye data
what we were talking about. The areas that we bowled, the lengths that we
bowled, what was and wasn’t successful, and talked about how we were going to
tighten that up. And they did it beautifully in the last game.”