Sri Lanka look to put themselves right into the semi-final picture on Friday when the Cricket World Cup rolls into Durham for the first time in the tournament. They face a South Africa side who aren’t playing for a whole lot in a match that is huge for the Asian outfit.
A win here and they move level on points with England in the race for fourth spot with a potentially winnable game with West Indies to come later in the tournament. South Africa will be eager to save some pride over their last two matches.
AllSportsBetting Podcast
Both Kev and Steve return with the AllSPortsBetting Podcast with bets as Sri Lanka look to keep their semi-final hopes on track when they take on South Africa as Durham joins the World Cup party for the first time. Click play below to listen to their thoughts and bets.
South Africa
We all know that this has been a tournament to forget for the Proteas, we’ve said it throughout and there is no point in dwelling on it. Where the concern will come is in the form of their latest outing against Pakistan where their bowling gave off the impression that they want to be out of here, and barring one or two cameos there wasn’t a whole lot more on offer from their batsmen either. Their usual excellent fielding wasn’t great to be fair so they have a few issues.
I’m not sure what they will do to get it, but South Africa really need to find a focus to get a performance. If they go home with their only win in the tournament being over Afghanistan they are going to face all sorts of criticisms and heads are likely to roll. You would hope that with the pressure off, and taking on an opponent they have dominated over the last three years, they will relax and play well but time will tell on that one.
Sri Lanka
It has been a much more encouraging campaign for Sri Lanka than many expected it to be when the tournament got underway and while they have had some luck along the way, we should take away from their two victories and the fact that the demise of others have kept them in the tournament. The big thing as far as they are concerned is that they haven’t put up anything close to a complete performance or anything approaching their best display yet they remain heavily in the mix still.
The credit so far has to go to the Sri Lankan bowling attack which has really delivered the goods when the chance has arisen. Their batting hasn’t covered itself in glory thus far but there is still time for that area of their game to shine and if it does they could be very dangerous. Sri Lanka probably have to win their final three matches but they can only do that if they win here.
Team News
South Africa are toying with the idea of bringing JP Duminy back into their ranks. He retires from ODI cricket at the end of the tournament so he has a maximum of two 50 over games left for his country. David Miller or Aiden Markram could make way.
Sri Lanka could be without Nuwan Pradeep who has a bug leading into the match. He could be replaced by Suranga Lakmal in what will surely be their only change after such a fine win against England last week.
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Betting
I’ll go with three bets here. The first of them comes in the form of the total runs market where a line of 530.5 might be a touch on the high side. There have only ever been three scores of 300 or more in 16 ODIs on this ground and even if someone makes one here the other is going to have to make in excess of 200 and I don’t see both batting line ups getting the job done here. There are some decent bowlers on show in this match and a ground which isn’t conducive to big scores given the big outfield and tricky wicket. Under 530.5 runs looks the way ahead to me here.
Dhananjaya de Silva has impressed me recently in this tournament. He has taken 2/40 and 3/32 in his last two matches and also in this event he has a score of 29 with the bat. In his last seven ODIs against South Africa over the last 18 months he has scores of 84, 10, 30, 39, 15, 22 and 12 and bowling efforts of 0/32, 1/26, 1/21, 0/21, 2/55, 3/41 and 0/3 from one over so he clearly likes playing South Africa. I guess that is because they are terrible at spin but whatever the reason he looks to have three scoring methods and they can see him past 41.5 performance points.
Finally Andile Phehlukwayo has shown good form with the bat in this event. He made 34 against India earlier in the competition and 46* against Pakistan last time out so he looks a little big at 33/1 to top score in a match where I expect big efforts to be few and far between. The all-rounder scored 38* against Sri Lanka in Durban earlier in the year and he might not need to put too many more on top of that to be in the mix here.
Tips
WON – Back Under 530.5 runs for a 4/10 stake at 1.83 with Betway
Back it here:
Back D.de Silva’s Performance – Over 41.5pts for a 4/10 stake at 1.85 with 888sport
Back him here:
Back A.Phehlukwayo Top South Africa Batsman for a 1/10 stake at 34.00 with Coral
Back him here:
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