Expectations high against South Africa - Mahela

by Ranjan Anandappa

It is natural that the expectations will be high whenever Sri Lanka plays on their home soil, and this South African tour will be no exception, specially after a successful England tour where we fared exceptionally well said the Sri Lanka captain Mahela Jayawardena at a press briefing held at the Taj Samudra Ballroom prior to the engagements with South Africa.

Sri Lanka will play two Tests both in Colombo and a triangular one day International series engaging South Africa and India too. These matches too will be in Colombo.

"Playing in front of a local audience generates quite a lot of pressure as the expectations are high. But since the performance in England brought us good results, the players have learnt many good lessons and are in a good frame of mind to face any situation", said the Sri Lankan captain.

"We should forget the England tour and concentrate more on getting used to the local conditions. In England, we got good wickets and our batsmen lived upto expectations" Jayawardena said. Answering a question about his future as captain, Jayawardena said that he is still the stand- in captain and whenever the regular skipper Atapattu is ready to take over the reins, he is prepared to hand it over.

Under Atapattu's leadership the youngsters were groomed said Jayawardena.

The South African captain Ashwell Prince will go down in history as the first coloured player to lead his country in the absence of regular captain Graeme Smith, said that the security situation in Sri Lanka was monitored and they had no problem in making the tour.

Prince said that the scale should tilt more towards the Sri Lankans as their key players Sanath Jayasuriya, Kumar Sangakkara, Mahela Jayawardena and Muralitharan are playing upto expectations right now.

South Africa will be minus three of their key players namely skipper Graeme Smith, Jacques Kallis (both injured) and Shaun Pollock who will miss the first Test due to his wife's confinement. Pollock should make the team for the second Test and ODI series.

"Despite the non- availability of three key players, my captaincy policies will not be changed as all players know their roles and should play accordingly", said the South African captain.

The Test series is sponsored by Janashakthi Insurance and its Managing Director Chandra Schaffter said that just over two years, Janashakthi sponsored the previous South African cricket tour.

However, they did not fare well and hoped that they will fight hard this time to make the series more competitive. Schaffter said that the South Africans are without three of their front line players, but without key players some teams are capable of hitting back and hoped that South Africa are capable enough to produce that kind of form.