Sangakkara: We can chase almost any total

2015 World Cup

Cricket365
March 2, 2015

Sri Lanka veteran batsman Kumar Sangakkara continued his superb run of form on Sunday, scoring an unbeaten 117 off 86 balls as his side beat England by a whopping nine wickets in Wellington.

Sanga, who recorded his second ton in as many games, came in as they chased 310 to win, and made light work of the England bowlers, and afterwards said that on their day the Sri Lankans could chase nearly any score put in front of them.

Sangakkara, who recorded his quickest ODI ton, off 70 balls, said after the match: "The wicket was pretty good and everything I tried came off.

"It was just a case of batting long and built a partnership. If we have to chase 10 an over in the last nine-10 overs we were pretty confident we could do it."

For his part, Lahiru Thirimanne, who made 139 not out, was impressed by his prolific team-mate, saying he merely tried to hand the strike to Sangakkara and let him bring the run rate down while he, Thirimanne, kept things steady at one end.

The opener said: "I think he played a tremendous knock today that eases the pressure because at that time run rate was about 7, 7.5, so when he came to bat he just rotated the strike and hit boundaries.

"So it was easy for me in the other end because I just wanted to rotate the strike and let Kumar to bat through the innings."

He then looked ahead to their next match, against co-hosts Australia, and said that while they lost their opening fixture against New Zealand, they had found there feet and were confident of keeping their winning form going.

He added: "I think anything can happen in this tournament. We were one down when things started, but we came back really hard, but that's not the end.

"We had to play against Australia in the next match, so we want to give a 100 per cent and win that match also, so that's it."