Two sides who have made indifferent starts to their ICC Cricket World Cup campaigns meet in the one game in the tournament on Monday when Australia take on Sri Lanka in a dare not lose clash in Lucknow.
Both teams have lost their opening two matches and a third loss in succession, while not officially costly, will leave whoever suffers it the potential of needing to win their remaining six games to be in with a chance of a semi-final spot. This isn’t quite knockout cricket but it isn’t far off it.
Australia
While Australia have the saving grace that they have lost to the two teams who have looked a cut above the rest so far in the competition, they will be more than a touch concerned at how both games have played out. With the exception of a few overs with the new ball in their first match against India, Australia haven’t really been a factor in either match and that will very much be something they will be looking to address here.
The big issue for Australia is that while a couple of months out from this tournament their batting looked fearsome and they appeared likely to outscore the opposition, they are yet to pass 200 in the competition and that aggressive batting has been reduced to scratching around a lot of the time. Another problem is that their bowling unit have not bowled well as a collective. They looked a spinner short to begin with but their main tweaker isn’t delivering the goods at all so Australia have problems to address heading into this one.
Sri Lanka
While Sri Lanka won’t have wanted to lose their opening two matches in the competition, they have lost them to South Africa and Pakistan, both of whom have come out of the blocks fast. Injuries are absolutely crippling Sri Lanka and since their loss to Pakistan last time out they have lost their captain Dasun Shanaka for the remainder of the tournament. Those injuries have hurt them so far and you wonder if this will be the tipping point.
Sri Lanka have been taken apart in the field in this tournament but we should probably have expected that to be the case given the raft of injuries they have had to their bowling attack and Shanaka being out isn’t going to help that any. The positive for Sri Lanka heading into this match is that unlike their opponents in this game they have been very good with the bat against two competent attacks so if their batters can go well again here they might lead them to some joy.
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Team News
Australia made two changes for the last match but you couldn’t say either worked. Sean Abbott is the only player who hasn’t featured from the start of a game but there is nobody for him to come in for so the former champions could be unchanged.
Sri Lanka will be forced into a change with Dasun Shanaka ruled out on the remainder of the tournament. Kusal Mendis will take over the captaincy and new call up Chamika Karunaratne is likely to come in for him. Matheesha Pathirana is a doubt with a shoulder issue.
Betting
I’m going to leave the match outcome alone here. If Sri Lanka weren’t forced into a key change with their captain out and potentially another one with a key bowler out I might have chanced them at the prices but if Australia can’t get some runs against such a depleted attack as this one they might never score any in this tournament. Ultimately, I want to see those runs come along before I place my faith in it happening so it is the side markets for me for a punt.
The market in question is the one for the player performance market regarding Dhananjaya de Silva who could have a more elevated role after the loss of the captain Dasun Shanaka. To be fair, de Silva might have had a larger role given the low and turning nature of the pitch in Lucknow anyway and he has a good record against Australia. In the three ODIs which Sri Lanka won against Australia last season he scored 34, 25 and 60 and his bowling efforts were 2/26, 1/35 and 2/39 so he covered a performance target of 29.5 on all three occasions. Including the warm up matches he has scored 55, 22, 11 and 25 in India and while he hasn’t taken a wicket yet he has only bowled four overs on roads in Delhi and Hyderabad. This pitch isn’t a road or anything like it and I expect more overs from Dhananjaya which should give him even more scope to get to 30 points and beyond.
Tips
Back D.de Silva’s Performance – Over 29.5pts for a 3/10 stake at 1.83 with Bet365
