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Home , Aravinda de Silva, Chaminda Vaas, Imran Nazir (cricketer), Marvan Atapattu, Moin Khan, Nuwan Zoysa

/ ATAPATTU'S IN VAIN lifts maiden Asia Cup By Vijay Lokapally pass. Facing a daunting target, , JUNE 7. Pakistan peaked precisely made some desperate experiments at when it needed to and Sri Lanka the top. Not many matches are won slumped when it should not have as a through such measures and soon it was packed audience at the Bangabandhu clear that Pakistan was on way to a com- National Stadium was treated to some fortable victory. vintage cricket in the final of the Asia The swift Romesh Kaluwitharana was Cup here. out without facing a ball, ironically by a limping . Vaas tried a The vintage part of the contest was fatal cross-batted shot and the match Qtafted by in a thrilling in- was sealed by Pakistan when Sanath nings as the match brought the tourna- Jayasuriya top-edged the ball back to the ment to an exciting climax, thanks to the bowler. For Sri Lanka to win from that spirited show by the Sri Lankan middle point would have been no less than a order. miracle, for Pakistan was doing nothing The century by gave wrong this day. On the other hand, Sri the match a competitive flavour and the Lanka was a shadow of the spotless field- spirit of the game was exemplified by ing side it is known as. Kaushalya Weeraratne, who could not Sri Lanka grassed seven catches but bat due to injury, walking out just to none as lethal as the return chance from congratulate the opposition which won Moin to Vaas. He lost sight of the skier by 39 runs. and shall rue the misdeed for long as it In keeping with its splendid run this allowed Moin to snuff the life out of the season, Pakistan added the Asia Cup to Lankan bowlers with his daring charge. the tides it won in and the West Like a true , Moin was leading Indies but this one was special indeed. It from the front. was Pakistan's first ever tide win in seven Jayasuriya had a terrible time on the editions of the Asia Cup. field. He was guilty of two catching laps- One casual moment in the field cost es and then he erred in the last Sri Lanka dearly and Pakistan capitalised over in which he went for 21 runs. The on it to plunder 277 off the stipulated Sri Lankan bowling and went to overs. It was not a dropped catch, there pieces in the last five overs when Pakis- were seven of them, but a misfield which tan plundered 72 runs. It was a sensa- broke the order and allowed the Pakista- tional phase of Pakistan's as nis to sneak in and rattle the opposition Moin and Inzamam swung the match with some robust and some innovative their team's way. strokeplay by the ebullient Moin. The first half of the Pakistan innings A hard sweep by Moin saw Chaminda was spent in a steady run accumulation Vaas allow the ball go through his legs. but the second half was a torrent. As CLASS ACT: Saeed Anwar drives Muttlah MuralKharan of Until then the Sri Lankans nad main- clouds gave way to a clear sky for the first tained their excellent standards in time today a hurricane arrived in the Sri Lanka In a scintillating knock In the Asia Cup final at Dhaka ground fielding but that lapse opened shape of Moin to sweep the opposition on Wednesday. the doors for a rapid pace of runs into off its feet. splendid form and Moin did extremely There might have been some worry in the Pakistani coffer. For long, one had well to maintain the tempo. the Pakistan camp when Man-of-the-se- not seen the Sri Lankans put up such a Moin mauls Lankans Limited overs cricket is known to pro- ries Yousuf Youhana failed for the first shoddy fielding display and Pakistan was It was an innings which overshadowed time in four innings but Anwar and In- not the one to let such opportunities duce some astounding strokeplay but some brilliant work by Saeed Anwar and the affable Moin created a range of baf- zamam steadied the situation as they are Inzamam-ul-Haq. The Sri Lankan bow- fling shots. A huge six off Vaas to mid- wont to. lers had no clue because Moin stepped was a beauty and the The day, however, belonged to Moin. out and side stepped to connect the ball paddle-sweep off the same bowler sim- His dazzling performance put the rest in with sweet timing. He was let off twice ply breathtaking. Sri Lanka missed the the shade as he proudly displayed the and made the most of the chances by servics of Kaushalya Weeraratne in the 'man of the match' memento which slamming a majestic half century which slog overs since he was off due to a finger paved the way for his mates to hold the laid Sri Lanka low. injury. Asia Cup. Sri Lanka lacked the motivation to fight after Pakistan recovered from a few shocks in the middle order. Barring the i--!»M:m»7:T-T'j effort by Atapattu and his partnerships with and the hard-hit- ting Russell Arnold, the Sri Lankan bat- PAKISTAN C. Vaas b M. Akram 10 Saeed Anwar c Muralittiaran (14b, 1x4) ting was short of depth. The match was b Jayasuriya 82 M. Atapattu c Moin b W. Akram 100 prolonged by the gutsy Atapattu, who hit (115b, 6x4, 1x6) (124b, 10x4) a spirited century but failed to change c and b Zoysa 3 Aravinda de Silva c Youhana the course of the game. (12b) b Arshad 20 Sri Lanka did well to restrict Pakistan c Arnold b Zoysa 22 (43b) to 107 at the halfway stage. The bowlers (27b, 2x4) R. Arnold c Afridi b Arshad 41 Yousuf Youhana c and b Chandana 25 (44b, 4x4, 2x6) stuck to their field and the batsmen (54b) M. Jayawardena (run out) 0 found it tough to force the pace. Anwar Inzamam-ul-Haq () 72 (1b) produced a lively innings with some (66b, 5x4, 1x6) U. Chandana b W. Akram 24 rasping shots square of the wicket but Moin Khan (not out) 56 (16b, 2x4, 1x6) fell to a tame sweep. He had two 'lives' (31 b, 3x4, 4x6) (not out) 6 Extras (b-3, lb-7, nb-5, w-2) 17 but Sri Lanka managed to pack him just (16b, 1x4) M. Muralitharan c (sub) S. Malik when the death overs commenced. Ac- Total (for four wkts. In 50 overs) 277 tually it proved fatal to the fielding side b Razzaq 0 (2b) as Moin exploded and Inzamam, having Fall of : 1-17 (Nazir), 2-56 (Afridi), Kaushalya Weeraratne (absent hurt) preserved his energy through a runner, 3-124 (Youhana), 4-173 (Anwar). Extras (lb-8, nb-2, w-5) 15 joined in the act to scatter the field and Sri Lanka bowling: 8-0- leave the Sri Lankans dazed. 52-0, Nuwan Zoysa 8-1-44-2, Kaushalya Total (In 45.2 overs) 238 Moin's strategy was simple. He has Weeraratne 6-0-23-0, this canny ability to place the ball short 10-0-42-0, 10-0-43-1, Sa- Fall of wickets: 1-6 (Kaluwitharana), 2-21 of the fielder or in the gaps with ease. He nath Jayasuriya 8-0-63-1 . (Vaas), 3-46 (Jayasuriya), 4-1 17 (Aravinda), paced his innings in a masterly fashion 5-196 (Arnold), 6-202 (Jayawardena), 7-220 and there were two shots which gave SRI LANKA (Atapattu), 8-237 (Chandana). Marvan Atapattu, who htt a century him the confidence. In one over of Nu- S. Jayasuriya c & b M. Akram 22 Pakistan bowling: W. Akram 8-0-38-2, M. (25b, 3x4) Akram 8-0-50- 2, Razzaq 7.2-0-40-1, Mah- during Sri Lanka's chase, wan Zoysa, he flat-batted him for a four R. Kaluwitharana (run out) 0 mood 10-0-40-0, Arshad 10-0-42-2, Afridi 2- cuts Mohd. Akram. and then stepped out to flick him for a (Ob) 0-20- 0. — Photos: V.V. Krishnan six. These were shots of a batsman in