Devapriya said that the fear of facing fast bowling was WORLD CUP WAS A no more there as the tournament proved LEARNING Sripali Weerakkody the leading wicket-taker for Sri Lanka. CURVE Chamari Atapattu batting during her epic knock of 178 not out against defending champs FOR US Australia at Bristol SA’ADI THAWFEEQ tice a lot of variation range of shots and I can see that little. They have to gain confidence to play these shots,” ri Lanka may have won only one match out of they are now capable of using those shots. We are con- said Devapriya. “We noticed that against sides like seven at the ICC Women’s World Cup in England, centrating now on taking more singles because the confi- Australia, England, India and New Zealand very hardly but coach Hemantha Devapriya believes the expe- dence is not there. We have given them a lot of singles do you get a loose ball. They are accurate and they are Srience of playing against the top seven countries targets which quietly they are improving but still we are well ahead in the practical and mental game. Technically in the world was certainly a learning curve for the future. not upto international standards like other teams. Plac- we don’t have powerful bodies we have to put the players Sri Lanka defeated Pakistan in their final league match ing the ball and working with soft hands those are the through special exercises to get more power into their to return home with a win, but according to Devapriya areas we are working on,” he said. shots and bowling. Fielding is coupled with fitness. The they came quite close to winning against West Indies and “The tournament enabled our players to really see the players now have a better understanding of what is India if not for the middle order batting and fielding. standards of the other teams. It’s a big demand for them required of them to become better cricketers.” Devap- Sri Lanka lost to India by 16 runs after chasing 233 to work hard and get into that level within a very short riya, a former Sri Lanka batsman/wicket-keeper of the and to West Indies by 47 runs chasing 230. time. They have been talking to players from other teams pre-Test era said what Sri Lanka Women’s cricket needed “Overall I am happy with their performance but we and they know the areas they have to work on and they at this stage is to strengthen their second string and could have done a little better if our middle order batting are ready to learn. It’s a matter of working hard, creating provide a feeder to the first team. and fielding came up to their capabilities,” said Devapri- motivation and setting up goals and achieving them.” “If you notice our present side has aging players. India ya. Citing the positives that Sri Lanka took from the Devapriya said that the fear of facing fast bowl- has several players who played in the last World Cup tournament Devapriya said, “We were struggling ing was no more there as the tournament because they introduced them as youngsters. Now they to put 200 plus runs on the board and only two proved. are with a lot of experience behind them and their mental players had strike rates of over 50 – Chamari Chamari Atapattu was Sri Lanka’s stand and tactical game is streets ahead of us. India has devel- Atapattu and Eshani Lokusuriyage. How- out player with a stupendous knock of 178 oped fast they were a little ahead of us when we played ever if you see during the tournament we against defending champions Australia. them in the last World Cup. But now for us to get there crossed the 200-run mark on four She had an aggregate of 311 runs and a it’s going to take some time,” said Devapriya. occasions and the girls have strike rate of 89 and in the bowling new “Sri Lanka Cricket in the recent past has introduced shown improvement in their ball bowlers Sripali Weerakkody (8 wick- an under 23 tournament. There was no tournament like strike rates. Some batters ets) and Ama Kanchana (7 wickets) stood that before. The selectors picked 60 players from the strike rates have gone up out. “We worked a lot on playing off the tournament called the development squad and after fur- to 85-90 and that is a back foot and how to use the pace of the ball ther trials pruned it down to 30. Of that we are hoping to good indication. especially the flat bat shot and the sweep shot get at least another 5-6 players and from the emerging “We did prac- and inside out shots. The players are now squad a further 4-5 players. We’ll have to work closely taking calculated risks and play- with them and see how they can fit into the national ing those shots little squad. by “What is encouraging is that leading girls’ schools have now taken upto cricket. At the moment we have about 2500 girls playing and Sri Lanka Cricket is working hard to promote the game. If all goes well we might see some good play- ers coming through the schools,” he said. Sri Lanka Women are next scheduled to tour the Caribbean for a series of five ODIs in October. The tour has yet to be finalized among the two cricket boards. SRI LANKA WOMEN BATTING & FIELDING M Inns NO Runs HS Ave St/Rt 100s 50s Ct/St C Atapattu 7 7 1 311 178* 51.83 88.85 1 1 5 D Manodara 7 7 0 206 84 29.42 67.10 0 2 2/0 A Kanchana 5 5 2 84 34* 28.00 89.36 0 0 1 O Ranasinghe 3 3 1 55 26 27.50 53.92 0 0 2 C Polgampola 3 3 0 80 49 26.66 38.64 0 0 0 S Siriwardene 7 7 0 169 37 24.14 56.33 0 0 1 P Weerakkody 6 6 1 80 30 16.00 63.49 0 0 4 N Hansika 6 6 0 87 31 14.50 47.54 0 0 1 H Perera 6 6 0 74 46 12.33 65.48 0 0 0 S Weerakkody 7 7 3 48 13* 12.00 70.58 0 0 0 K Lokusuriyage 5 5 0 54 28 10.80 49.09 0 0 0 I Ranaweera 7 4 3 10 6* 10.00 50.00 0 0 1 U Prabodhani 3 3 0 14 10 4.66 42.42 0 0 0 H Madavi 2 2 0 3 2 1.50 15.00 0 0 1 C Gunaratne 3 1 1 1 1* - 1.00 0.00 0 0 2 *Signifies Not Out SRI LANKA WOMEN BOWLING O M R W Best Ave Ec/Rt 5wI Ama Kanchana C Gunaratne 25 3 113 6 4/41 18.83 4.52 0 could develop S Weerakkody 46 5 198 8 3/28 24.75 4.30 0 into a good all- A Kanchana 32 1 175 7 2/31 25.00 5.46 0 rounder according I Ranaweera 52.4 4 246 6 2/55 41.00 4.67 0 to the coach. C Atapattu 15 0 101 2 1/28 50.50 6.73 0 S Siriwardene 48.3 1 247 2 1/33 123.50 5.09 0 Also Bowled: C Polgampola 12.5-0-63-0, U Prabodhani 14-1-118-0, O Ranasingh= e 10-0-54-0, E Lokusuriyage 13.4-0-78-0, H Madavi 2-0-14-0. Dilani Manodara scored a career WOMEN'S WORLD CUP STANDINGS best 84 in Sri Lanka’s win Women's World Cup table at end of league phase (played, won, lost, no resul= against Pakistan t, points, net run-rate): at Leicester. England 7 6 1 0 12 +1.29 - semi-finals Australia 7 6 1 0 12 +1.00 - semi-finals India 7 5 2 0 10 +0.66 - semi-finals South Africa 7 4 2 1 9 +1.18 - semi-finals New Zealand 7 3 3 1 7 +0.30 West Indies 7 2 5 0 4 -1.52 Sri Lanka 7 1 6 0 2 -1.09 Pakistan 7 0 7 0 0 -1.93 Note: All eight teams played each other, top four qualified for semi-finals.