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| Sunday, 20 March 2005 |
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Down Royal by 111 runs : Thomians regain Mustang trophy by Srian Obeyesekere S. Thomas' overcame an early hiccup recovering from 5 for 67 to an imposing 259 in 49.5 overs and restricted Royal to 148 in only 35.5 overs for a convincing 111-run win to regain the coveted Mustang Trophy after 4 years at the SSC grounds yesterday. Put into bat, the Thomian batting looked in shambles before 'Man of the Match' Dhanushka Colombage and Rayendra Karunaratne reeled off a 156-run partnership for the 6th-wicket to put them in control. Colombage struck four boundaries and two sixes in a 93-ball knock spanning 110 minutes and Karunaratne reached the fence thrice and over it once in his 100-ball innings in 137 minutes. With it went it sunk hopes of an understrength Royal, who were without regular skipper Dimitri Siriwardena and Kaushal Silva, both on duty with the Sri Lanka u-19 team in Pakistan, had of pulling it their way. They were not helped by poor fielding with both batsmen surviving as much as two chances each as Royal wilted against the Colombage-Karunaratne onslaught which put the bowlers to the sword from the 23rd over. The hundred came in the 28th over with a single by Karunaratne off Dulanjaya Wijeratne and the 150 in the 38th over from which point runs simply flowed. Colombage brought up his fifty of the second ball of the 41st over when he glanced Nadun Punchihewa for 3 runs. Karunaratne followed suit in the next over taking a single off Sukitha Senaratne as the Thomians maintained just over 5 runs an over. Royal started disastrously losing opener Dilan Nanayakkara for a duck in the 4th ball of the first over bowled by Sajith Kularatne who had him well held by first slip Shashika Pussegolla. They slipped to 3 for 41 and 4 for 66 before a fifth-wicket stand between Maligaspe and Dulanjaya Wijeratne took the total to 121 before the latter edged a Nigel Adams delivery to wicket-keeper Weerawardena. He made 24. A run out when Dhiren Warnakulasuriya was stranded by a direct hit by Sanjeev Mendis from short fine leg signalled the end for Royal. Skipper Vidhyesh Balasubramaniam then polished off the rest claiming 3
wickets for 16 runs. |
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