Aravinda: The star that won the World Cup final for Sri Lanka By A. C. de Silva   There is one former Sri Lankan cricketer who occupies the seat he deserves. He is Aravinda de Silva - the Chairman of selectors. He has all the qualifications to occupy the 'hot seat'. He has captained Sri Lanka and also played important roles to see that Sri Lanka stays on top. As Chairman of the selectors, Aravinda de Silva and his selectors have picked a side that is capable of becoming the champions and repeat the World Cup success of 1996 when the final was played in Lahore, Pakistan on that memorable day - March 17. The very fact Sri Lanka won the World Cup then was the most epic factor about it all. In his own words: "When we won the World Cup we had a fine batting side and to back up the batting, we also had a good fielding side. Our bowling was capable of containing any team," De Silva said on that victory. The Sri Lanka team then was led by Arjuna Ranatunga. Sri Lanka deserved their triumph not just for the quality of their cricket, but for the calm attitude and dignity they adopted in going for victory. The victory turned out to be sweet as the Lankans were subjected to cruel allegations of ball tampering and throwing in Australia and on the eve of that tournament the biggest draw cards were the withdrawals of Australia and the West Indies from their preliminary round matches in Sri Lanka, citing security concerns. There had been a bomb blast a few days before the World Cup began. Right now the only worry seems to be that the middle-order batting needs to be sorted out. Sri Lanka skipper Arjuna Ranatunga defied World Cup history, by asking favourites Australia to bat first after winning the toss - a move which brought the ultimate victory by seven wickets in front of 23,826 spectators that day at the Gaddafi Stadium in Lahore. Ranatunga defied any accepted one day strategy, Ranatunga left all but the first 13 overs to his pack of slow bowlers and, shifting them with great skill, strangled the life out of Australia's accomplished batsmen who lost their cool. The Aussies lost their first wicket at 36 when Mark Waugh was out for 12 - caught by Jayasuriya off Vaas. Then a 101-run stand for the second wicket between M.A. Taylor (74) and Ricky Ponting (45) - the present skipper, put the Aussies on top, but then it was the turn of the Sri Lanka spinners who struck and the Aussie wickets started to tumble. Shock followed the Aussies and when their quota of 50 overs were gone, the Aussies had made 241 losing seven wickets. Before batting, Aravinda de Silva struck hard and came off with an astonishing performance with the ball, claiming three wickets for 42 runs off nine overs. As in the semi-final against India, Sri Lanka made a shock start when they went into bat. The Lankans lost two wickets for 23 runs, losing the wickets of Jayasuriya for 9 and Romesh Kaluwitharana for 6. It was depressing for the Lankans, but in came 'never-say-die' Aravinda de Silva to the middle. Not for the first time in the competition, the magical De Silva and the stately Asanka Gurusingha, who earlier in a group match against Zimbabwe hit 6 sixes to equal the World Cup record shared by Viv Richards and Kapil Dev, staged a recovery of sorts and before too long, the game was out of the reach of the Aussies. The final really did belong to Aravinda de Silva whose second consecutive dazzling innings at a time of the most extreme examination confronted him as one of the four outstanding batsmen of his era. Having taken three wickets with his fast off-breaks and taking two catches, De Silva joined Clive Lloyd and Vivian Richards as the only centurymakers in World Cup finals. Aravinda de Silva made 107 not out off 124 balls with 13 fours. Ranatunga joined Lloyd, Kapil Dev, Allan Border and Imran Khan as the only men to have lifted the glittering prize.