National Coach
| Dav Whatmore National Coach |
New Zealand were also nervous before the game, having lost a home series and with a few injuries to key players. The match itself was a low key and pretty ordinary affair. It resembled a sparring bout as the two sides traded speculative punches and tentatively explored each other's weaknesses.
In the end the fact that the wicket favoured spin helped Sri Lanka grab the initiative in the second innings and defend a moderate total. With Eric Upashantha having claimed a few crucial top-order wickets, the New Zealand batsmen struggled against the off spin of Muttiah Muralitharan and Kumar Dharmasena.
The victory gave us a lift and ensured us a psychological advantage over New Zealand in the remaining games. They were immediately on the back foot, clearly lacked confidence, and we believed that they didn't have the firepower to bowl us out. Indeed, they failed to do so until the final match.
We moved on to Wellington in what proved to be the key game of the tour. Having restricted New Zealand to 205 in their first innings we lost early wickets as New Zealand came back very strongly. Russel Arnold and Aravinda de Silva, however, rescued the innings with a crucial partnership. Eschewing risks they cleverly worked the ball into the gaps and gradually shifted the initiative back to Sri Lanka. Then, when Aravinda was out, Dharmasena, Upashantha and Zoysa helped guide us home.
Russel Arnold once again showed us what a cool head he possesses when under pressure. We were really impressed by the way that he constructed his innings and refused to panic despite the loss of wickets.
New Zealand were always going to find it difficult to lift themselves in the third game in Auckland having come so close and yet been denied victory in Wellington. Their woes were compounded by the timely return to form of Sanath Jayasuriya. Like many of the players, he had lacked confidence going into the series, but he rarely goes long without a big score.
The match was reduced to 47 overs because of a late start and we restricted them to 181 thanks to some excellent bowling, particularly by Kumar Dharmasena and Nuwan Zoysa, who for me was the pick of the fast bowlers throughout the tour. He started really well in Napier with a tight spell that was the catalyst for Upastantha's four wickets and went on to take vital wickets throughout the series and bowl very economically.
Kumar Dharmasena was a revelation. When he returned against South Africa last year after two years away from international cricket, he lacked the self-belief that I had previously associated with him. However, he has grown in confidence during recent months and performed superbly with both bat and ball. His run-up has changed and he bowls slower now, but he still has good variation and the New Zealand batsmen struggled to score off him. Amazingly they failed to score a single boundary off him until the last game of the series.
We felt that 181 on a good batting pitch was insufficient and expected to win the game, but not by the eventual margin of nine wickets and with 17 overs to spare. We did so thanks to Sanath's sparkling century, the feature of which was the manner in which he picked up anything on his legs, always a sign that he is in good form. Marvan Attapattu gave further evidence that he too has turned the corner with a composed half-century.
Having secured the series we travelled to Hamilton for the fourth game. We eventually won the Duckworth/Lewis-affected match by three runs, thanks to a 97-run opening partnership in 13 overs between Sanath and Romesh Kaluwitharana, who had been brought into the side when the game was reduced to 37 overs. It became closer than it should have been when we lost a couple of wickets in the increasing gloom, but we scrapped home in the end when the umpires eventually called off play in the 30th over of the innings.
The final match of the series was played in Canterbury on the best pitch of the series. For the first time we saw some aggression from the New Zealanders. Jacob Oram was particularly impressive and he managed to really get after the spinners.
We weren't at our best in the field and the bowling was short and wide at times. In fact, the fielding was not up to our normally high standards throughout the tour. There was a few misfields and the odd dropped catch.
They finished on 282 and we unfortunately lost some early wickets. It took a while to build up the momentum but Russel Arnold once again led the way with support from Mahela Jayawardene, Kumar Dharmasena and Nuwan Zoysa, who made a lusty cameo at the end. We finished 13 runs short but it was a good game of cricket and the guys showed a lot of fight.
Although disappointing to have lost the final match in Canterbury it was a wonderful performance by the team to rebound so quickly after the disappointment in South Africa. Some have argued that we shouldn't have been playing a one-day series so soon to playing England, but I feel that is was just what we needed and we will go into the First Test Match at Galle a revitalised team.
© CricInfo
| Teams | New Zealand, Sri Lanka. |
| Players/Umpires | Muttiah Muralitharan, Kumar Dharmasena, Russel Arnold, Mahela Jayawardene. |
| Tours | England in Sri Lanka |
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