By CricketCountry Staff
Despite suffering from a hamstring injury, Muttiah Muralitharan ran through the New Zealand middle order scalping three crucial wickets to give Sri Lanka the upper hand in their Group A match at Mumbai. At the end of 25th over, New Zealand were reeling at 106 for six.
Published: Mar 18, 2011, 04:00 PM (IST)
Edited: Mar 18, 2011, 04:00 PM (IST)
Mid Innings Report
By CricketCountry Staff
Mumbai: Mar 18, 2011
Despite suffering from a hamstring injury, Muttiah Muralitharan ran through the New Zealand middle order scalping three crucial wickets to give Sri Lanka the upper hand in their Group A match at Mumbai. At the end of 25th over, New Zealand were reeling at 106 for six.
In their reply to Sri Lanka’s 266, New Zealand were cautious at the start, but were pegged back when they lost openers Brendon McCullum and Martin Guptill in first seven overs and then Jesse Ryder in the 16th.
Muralitharan added more to New Zealand’s woes by scalping the young Kane Williamson in 19th, skipper Ross Taylor in the 22nd and Scott Styris in the 24th over to leave their reply in tatters.
Mahela Jayawardene sent the dangerous McCullum back to the pavilion with a fine catch at the first slip off Angelo Mathews, while Guptill was declared lbw off Nuwan Kulasekara.
Ryder and Taylor tried stabilizing the New Zealand innings after early blows and even got lifelines due to sloppy fielding by the Sri Lankans. Ryder was dropped by Upul Tharanga off Mathews, whereas Kulasekara misjudged a catch off Taylor at third man, which went for a six. Their stand was broken by Ajantha Mendis, getting Ryder caught behind by Kumar Sangakkara in the 16th over.
Earlier, Sri Lanka scored 265 for nine in 50 overs with Sangakkara hitting an ODI hundred after a long time. He added 145 runs with Jayawardene, who scored 66 off 149 balls to help Sri Lanka recover from 19 for two in five overs.
Mathews played an important role to get Sri Lanka past 250, scoring 41 off 35 balls studded with four boundaries as wickets kept falling from the other end. Seamer Tim Southee claimed three Sri Lankan wickets including the run out of Tharanga, but gave 63 runs off his 10 overs.
Brief Scores: Sri Lanka 265 for 9 in 50 overs (Kumar Sangakkara 111, Mahela Jayawardene 66; Tim Southee 3 for 63, Nathan McCullum 2 for 48) vs New Zealand 106 for 6 in 25 overs (Ross Taylor 33; Muttiah Muralitharan 3 for 10, Nuwan Kulasekara 1 for 19, Angelo Mathews 1 for 19).
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