da luck： Sanath Jayasuriya, the Sri Lanka captain, defies all conventions ofbatsmanship when he is at the crease and at times he has been more than abowlers’nightmare
da bwin： Sa'adi Thawfeeq12-Aug-2001Sanath Jayasuriya, the Sri Lanka captain, defies all conventions ofbatsmanship when he is at the crease and at times he has been more than abowlers’nightmare. To say that Jayasuriya has more than a liking for the Indianbowling maybe an understatement. For he has not only dominated them butdecimated them to the extent that bowlers like Manoj Prabhakar and RajeshChauhan have been knocked out of the game and, Venkatesh Prasad and AnilKumble are still licking the wounds inflicted on them when India lasttoured here four years ago.Sourav Ganguly , Rahul Dravid and Venkatesh Prasad (members of the presentteam) will vividly recall what Jayasuriya did to them at the R. PremadasaStadium in August 1997 when he made the fourth highest score in Testcricket – 340, keeping them on the field for as long as 13 hours and 19minutes.After Nilesh Kulkarni became the first Indian bowler to take a wicket offhis first ball in Test cricket, India had to wait 1,103 balls for the nextwicket as Jayasuriya in liaison with Roshan Mahanama (225) shared Testcricket’s highest (576) and longest (753 minutes) partnership. They becamethe first pair to bat throughout two uninterrputed days of Test cricket.Jayasuriya recalling that innings said that he ranked it along with the 199he scored in the second Test of that series at the SSC, as the best of hisseven Test centuries.”I was middling the ball right from the beginning and I played with a lotof confidence,” said Jayasuriya.”There are times, when a batsman plays out the first few overs, he knows heis in good nick for a long innings. I had that feeling inside me that day,”he said.Three other Test knocks which Jayasuriya said he felt the same way when hemade the runs, was the double century he scored against England at the Ovalin 1998, the 146 he made at Galle and the 85 he scored at the SSC, bothagainst South Africa last year.What makes Jayasuriya a threat to opposing bowlers is that there is no setpattern in his approach to batting. He loses no time in taking theinitiative whether he hits the first ball of the innings for a six off asquare cut, a cover drive which lands in the stands or a flick off his legswhich flashes past the square-leg umpire. There is nothing transparentabout his batting.He is a master at pacing out his innings. A cautious half-century couldjust be the platform for him to launch an all out assault on the bowlinglater in the innings. One of the strong points of Jayasuriya’s batting ishis power. It is not just the new ball which flies off his bat, but the oldball is also smashed with equal ease.How much Jayasuriya relishes the Indian bowling can be guaged by the factthat he holds his country’s highest individual score in Test cricket (340)and one-day internationals (189) against the same opposition.The 189 made in the Coca Cola final at Sharjah in November last year heranks as his best one-day innings largely because of the circumstancesunder which he made it. Sri Lanka had lost four of their top batters for116 runs, and with only Russel Arnold as the last recognised batsman,Jayasuriya had to pace his innings out in such a manner that his sidefinished with a match-winning total.”I batted under a lot of pressure. It was a difficult innings to playbecause I was not able to take the risks I normally would in any othercircumstances. It restricted my stroke-play,” said Jayasuriya.Usually a batsman known to make most runs in the first 15 overs, Jayasuriyashowed another facet to his approach to batting. That he can bat throughthe entire innings. He was captain and took the full responsibilities uponhimself. Needless to say, Sri Lanka rattled up an imposing total of 299 forfive wickets and bowled India out for a paltry 54 to win the final by amile.Jayasuriya’s other notable one-day knocks against India have been hisunbeaten 151 in the Independence Cup tournament at Bombay and an unbeaten120 at the R. Premadasa Stadium.India has found Jayasuriya a major obstacle to them at all levels ofcricket. He has been their tormentor for the past five years or so. Despitehis high success rate against Indian bowlers, Jayasuriya has a lot ofrespect for them. “You have to respect the bowler if he is bowling well atyou. It is not easy as it sounds when you are out in the middle there. Youhave only to make one mistake and it can be curtains,” said Jayasuriya, whoprepares himself for another Test series against India having given them ahint of his present form with a match-winning knock of 99 in the Coca ColaCup tri-series final at the R. Premadasa Stadium last Sunday.SANATH JAYASURIYA’S RECORD AGAINST INDIA
TESTS T I NO HS Runs Avg 100s 50sCareer 59 101 9 340 3604 39.17 7 16v India 7 11 1 340 782 78.20 2 2ODI'S M I NO HS Runs Avg 100s 50sCareer 242 234 8 189 6906 30.55 11 45v India 46 44 3 189 1609 39.24 4 9
