April 17, 2007	Tuesday	Rabi-ul-Awwal 28, 1428

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ST GEORGE’S (Grenada), April 16: Captain Mahela Jayawardene helped rescue Sri Lanka from a precarious 27 for three to the comparative prosperity of 226 all out in their World Cup Super Eights match against Australia on Monday.

Jayawardene (72) and Chamara Silva (64) shared a third-wicket partnership of 140 but when they fell in consecutive overs to Brad Hogg the innings disintegrated.

Nathan Bracken returned the outstanding figures of four for 19 from 9.4 overs.

Sanath Jayasuriya started brightly by punching the final ball of Bracken's opening over for four through the covers and gathered another boundary when a top-edged hook flew over Adam Gilchrist's head to the boundary.

He had reached 12 from as many balls when he was lbw playing across a full-length delivery from Bracken.

Kumar Sangakkara lasted only four balls before he was also lbw without scoring to Glenn McGrath and Upul Tharanga fell without addition to the score for six.

Jayawardene and Silva played and missed against McGrath, whose first three overs cost five runs, but relished the return of Shaun Tait with Silva flicking a ball past Hayden to the boundary and square-cutting another four in the same over.

Captain Ricky Ponting did not take his second Powerplay immediately and the pair gathered runs comfortably against support bowlers Andrew Symonds and Michael Clarke.

The return of McGrath and Tait was the signal for further boundaries from each batsmen with Jayawardene lofting a full toss from the latter for a six to leg to bring up his 50 from 64 balls and the 100 partnership from 150.

After Silva finally perished sweeping Hogg to Clarke at short fine-leg and Jayawardene went in the left-arm spinner's final over stumped by Gilchrist, Australia wrapped up the innings with little fuss apart from two late sixes by Malinga Bandara (17).

Both teams have already qualified for the semi-finals and Sri Lanka rested their two leading bowlers Chaminda Vaas and Muttiah Muralitharan while the injured Lasith Malinga was not considered for selection.

 

Scoreboard
SRI LANKA:
W.U. Tharanga c Hayden b Bracken	6
S.T. Jayasuriya lbw b Bracken	12
K.C. Sangakkara lbw b McGrath	0
D.P.M. Jayawardene st Gilchrist b Hogg	72
L.P.C. Silva c Clarke b Hogg	64
T.M. Dilshan c Hodge b Tait	7
R.P. Arnold b Tait	3
M.F. Maharoof c Symonds b Bracken	25
K.M.D.N. Kulasekera c Hayden b Bracken	1
C.M. Bandara c Hogg b McGrath	17
C.R.D. Fernando not out	0
EXTRAS (LB-5, W-11, NB-3)	19
TOTAL (all out, 49.4 overs)	226
FALL OF WKTS: 1-26 (Jayasuriya, 4.3 ov), 2-27 (Sangakkara, 5.3 ov), 3-27 (Tharanga, 6.4 ov), 4-167 (Silva, 37.2 ov), 5-174 (Jayawardene, 39.4 ov), 6-178 (Dilshan, 40.6 ov), 7-183 (Arnold, 42.4 ov), 8-184 (Kulasekera, 43.3 ov), 9-218 (Bandara, 48.6 ov).
BOWLING: Bracken 9.4-3-19-4 (1w); Tait 10-0-68-2 (1nb, 6w); McGrath 9-1-48-2 (1nb); Hogg 10-0-35-2; Symonds 3-0-15-0 (1nb); Clarke 8-0-36-0.
AUSTRALIA: A.C. Gilchrist, M.L. Hayden, R.T. Ponting, M.J. Clarke, A. Symonds, B.J. Hodge, M.E.K. Hussey, G.B. Hogg, N.W. Bracken, S.W. Tait, G.D. McGrath.
UMPIRES: Aleem Dar (Pakistan) and B.R. Doctrove (West Indies).
TV UMPIRE: M.R. Benson (England).
MATCH REFEREE: Mike Procter (South Africa).—Reuters