Sri Lanka women’s team beat their Indian counterparts for the first time in seven years as Harshitha Samarawickrama and Nilakshika Silva with vital half centuries and the eighth wicket pair of Anushka Sanjeewani and Sugandika Kumari with a valuable partnership excelled for the hosts in the Tri Nation tournament match on Sunday.

Chasing a target of 276 runs to win Sri Lanka were seven wickets down for 238 runs but the eighth wicket pair of Anushka Sanjeewani and Sugandika Kumari kept their cool to reach the target with five balls to spare.

Put to bat, India made 275 for nine on the back of a 48-ball 58 from Richa Ghosh.

In their essay Sri Lanka’s batting clicked together as they recorded their second-highest successful chase. It was also their third win over India in the format.

Vishmi Gunaratne contributed with 33 runs. Dilhari made a quick fire 35. Anushka Sanjeewani and Sugandika Kumari put on an unfinished partnership. Kumari was the more impressive of the two, as she breezed her way to 19 not out off 20 – her highest international score. Sanjeewani made 23 not out off 28, and hit the winning runs.

Chief among the big performers was Silva, who produced arguably the innings of her career so far. She signalled her intentions early – fourth ball, she leapt down the track to Sneh Rana, India’s form bowler, and muscled her over long-on for six. This was only one of three big hits, as she motored her way to a 28-ball 50, hitting five fours as well, targeting the square boundaries either side of the wicket, though she also hit two fours through fine leg. Her best six came off left-arm spinner Shree Charani, whom she ran at and thumped over long-on. No other Sri Lanka batter cleared the rope.

When Silva arrived at the crease at Athapaththu’s dismissal, Sri Lanka needed 124 off 107 deliveries. When she was dismissed, they needed 38 off 44. India still had the opportunity to charge back into the game at this point, but Kumari’s early boundaries kept Sri Lanka surging, and Sanjeewani added heft to that final partnership.

Dinara de Silva won the second consecutive ITF Junior Circuit J30 girls’ singles title when she beat India’s Aleena Farid at the week 2 tournament final at the SSC courts on Saturday.

Dinara beat Aleena Farid 6-3, 6-1 in the final.

In the boys’ final Mahit Mekala (India) beat compatriot Pratyush Loganathan 3-6, 6-2, 6-2 to win the title.

Punjab Kings (PBKS) are marching towards a spot in the playoffs, moving up to No. 2 on the table. They dispatched one of their main rivals Lucknow Super Giants (LSG) with a power-packed batting performance, scoring 236 for 5, and winning by 37 runs. Shreyas Iyer actually wanted to bowl at the toss. But he said he was “up for the competition”, and it seemed so was his team.

They hit 34 boundaries in the innings – 16 fours and 18 sixes – en route to their 11th total of 200-plus in the IPL. Only Mumbai Indians have more. Prabhsimran Singh was the architect of this chaos. He attacked nine of his first 15 deliveries, and in that time he could’ve been dismissed for 22 off 11 balls. But Nicholas Pooran put down a skier. When a similar ball came down just seconds later, Prabhsimran played the same shot and found the straight boundary. He’s an intent machine with a very short memory. He made his third fifty on the trot, having come into this season with only four fifty-plus scores in his IPL career.There was a small period when Prabhsimran stalled. He got to 45 off 24 balls. Then made only 8 from 11 balls. but made up for that hitting 38 off his last 13 deliveries.

The batters at the other end matched Prabhsimran’s fire. In fact, every time LSG took a wicket, the new partnership began with a boundary within two deliveries, leaving the visitors with no place to hide. Shreyas once again showed he’s a changed man. Until IPL 2024, he was striking at 125. Since then, he has been striking at 163. That has not come at the cost of his productivity. He averaged 32 before. Now it’s 44.

Shashnak Singh played the perfect cameo, 33* off 15 balls which included a six off Mayank Yadav that legit tried to scale up to one of the Dharamsala mountain tops.