A Chamari Athapaththu seven-wicket haul and Nilakshika Silva’s 50 off 35 saw defending champions Sri Lanka withstand a valiant Indonesian side to register a resounding 75-run victory in their Asia Cup match in Dubai.

Athapaththu was undoubtedly the pick of the bowlers, as she started and finished Indonesia’s slide with career best figures of 7 for 05,  inclusive of a hat-trick – nearly two in fact. Chasing a target of 125, the opening pair of Maria Corazon and Rahmawati Pangestuti struck 16 runs in the first two overs, but once spin came into play scoring slowed down to a trickle and Indonesia were eventually bowled out for 49 in the 19th over.

Sri Lanka, too, had found it tough to combat Indonesia’s mix of spin and slow-medium seamers as they stumbled to 62 for 6 in the 13th over, but their innings received a timely boost as Nilakshika countered with a trademark back-against-the-wall effort to drag her side to a total that seemed about par on a pretty sluggish surface. In the end it proved to be plenty.

Sri Lanka struggle early on

Having been put in to bat on a fresh surface, Sri Lanka were perhaps guilty of a little complacency against their less-fancied opponents. Time and again the top order sought to find the boundary, and time and again they failed to find their timing.

On a wicket where the ball was hardly coming on, the Sri Lankan batters’ tunnel vision focused squarely on boundary hitting and eschewed strike rotation; there were 19 dot balls in a powerplay that had fetched 31 runs for the loss of two wickets.

By the halfway point of the innings, the dot count had risen to 28. The scorecard, meanwhile, read 47 for 5. Indonesia, to their credit, did well to bowl to their fields and frustrate the Lankan batters.

Sanjana Kavindi got to double-digits with a pair of nicely struck boundaries, but she was the only one of Sri Lanka’s top five to do so – and she was eventually done in on 15 missing an attempted cut on a straight one.

Nilakshika brings the Silva-lining

With recognised batting fast running out, Sri Lanka needed someone to take control of the innings, and as she has done so often over recent years it was Nilakshika that stood up to be counted.

She first strung together 17 off 18 with Kaushini Nuthyangana, but when Nuthyangana fell Nilakshika produced a masterclass in batting with the tail. She cajoled Kawya Kavindi to keep rotating the strike, and when the opportunity arose she was unerring in finding the boundaries – including Sri Lanka’s first and only six of the innings in the penultimate over.

Their seventh-wicket partnership eventually ended on 50 off 36, reached simultaneously alongside side Nilakshika’s fifty – her third in T20Is – but by then she had already ushered her side to safety.

Athapaththu steals the show

In Chethana Vimukthi, Sri Lanka might have their first ever genuine fast bowler but on a wicket where the ball was not quite coming on, pace never seemed like the answer. For the first two overs of the chase, Indonesia’s openers did well to find boundaries against Vimukthi and and fellow seamer Kawya, but then Sri Lanka introduced their spinners.

Athapaththu promptly castled Pangestuti before removing Corazon and Rada Rani off consecutive deliveries in her next over. Here she missed her hat-trick by a whisker, a yorker narrowly missing Desi Wulandari’s off stump.

She brought herself back into the attack in the 14th and removed Nanda Sakarini, and she capped things off by achieving her hat-trick at the second time of asking, taking three wickets off what proved to be the final three deliveries of the innings.

Scores:
Sri Lanka Women  124 for 7  in 20 overs (Sanjana Kavindi 15, Nilakshika Silva 50, Kawya Kavindi 15*; Ni Ariani 1-23, Sang Maypriani 2-15, Ni Luh Dewi 3-32, Sofia Velic 1-21) beat   Indonesia Women  49 all out in 18.3 overs (Rahmawati Pangestudi 10, Ni Made Putri Suwandevi 12; Kavya Kavindi 1-14, Sugandika Kumari 1-03,  Chamari Athapaththu 7-05, Kavisha Dilhari 1-02) by 75 runs

[Cricinfo]

The Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) relating to the project to provide technological solutions to prevent wild elephants from being hit by trains was signed yesterday (01) afternoon at the President’s Media Centre, under the patronage of Secretary to the President Dr Nandika Sanath Kumanayake.

Coordinated through the “Clean Sri Lanka” programme, the project is being implemented as a public-private partnership, with the Railway Department, the Department of Wildlife Conservation and the Forest Conservation Department working together, with full financial support from People’s Bank.

The system consists of three-beam detection, passive infrared (PIR) sensors, automatic temperature sensors and a tamper alarm system to detect animals weighing more than 20 kilogrammes and unauthorised interference. Signal lights (red/yellow/green) installed on either side of the railway tracks, together with a special screen installed inside the locomotive cab, will alert the driver in advance to the exact location of an elephant.

A demonstration test of the system was successfully conducted at the Pinnawala Elephant Orphanage premises in the presence of the relevant officials, following which a report on the system was prepared.

The system will be implemented as a pilot project from next month at 13 locations where wild elephant accidents are frequent. A newly developed website is also scheduled to be launched to enable the progress of the project to be viewed live.

Additional General Manager of Railways P.D.S.B. Chandrasena, Director General of Wildlife Conservation M.S.L.R.P. Marasinghe, Conservator General of Forests S.C. Palamakuumbura and Chairman of People’s Bank Chandana Guniyangoda signed the relevant MoU. Officials from the Clean Sri Lanka Secretariat, including Presidential Additional Secretary (Clean Sri Lanka) Engineer S.P.C. Sugeeshwara, as well as senior officials from the Railway Department, Department of Wildlife Conservation, Forest Conservation Department and People’s Bank, were also present.

[President’s Media Division]