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Sikandar Raza

ZIMBABWE batsman Sikandar Raza believes that the team is getting rewarded for the consistency in their selection policy as they came back strongly in the second game of the tri-nation series by earning a 12-run win over Sri Lanka.

Raza played a big part as Zimbabwe held on to their nerve to earn a win that kept them alive in the series. He scored an unbeaten 81 runs to give the final push in their innings and later picked up the crucial wicket of Kusal Perera, who kept Zimbabwe at bay during the chase.

“I think consistency in selection definitely helped,” Raza said after the game. “I think we have gone with the same squad for a lot of series and that is certainly showing up.

“When I have a guy next to me in the change room for a longer period of time, it gives you that extra confidence. You can call what the shots the batsman are going to be playing, this is the trust we have among ourselves.

“This team is a band of brothers and we have been playing together for a long time. We back each other regardless of the situation. We back each other to defend 120,” he added.

Raza also attributed the success to the belief the members of the team have amongst themselves and mentioned that they are keen on sending a message ahead of the World Cup qualifier at home.

“Secret behind it is the trust, character, faith among ourselves. We are determined to go into the World Cup qualifiers with a strong message we want to send out to all the teams,” said Raza.

“I thought we had a fantastic year and a half; we underperformed in SA as well; we could have done a lot better. It was a wake-up call that we needed, so we wanted to show some grittiness here. We wanted to play positive cricket,” Raza said.

Zimbabwe play Sri Lanka again in their next game on Sunday. The Sri Lankans will be out in search for redemption today against hosts Bangladesh who beat Zimbabwe in the first match.

The Sri Lankans were yesterday sweating over the fitness of the injured Angelo Mathews amid fear that the player could be ruled out for the rest of this series. Mathews has been troubled by a right hamstring injury since January last year and the injury flared up again after Sri Lanka’s 12-run defeat to Zimbabwe on Wednesday.

Sri Lanka, already under fire after losing their opening fixture against Zimbabwe had not named a vice-captain for the tri-nation series, but SLC officials confirmed that Test captain Dinesh Chandimal will lead the side in Mathews’s absence.

“Angelo went for a scan today and the reports have been sent to England for the doctors who have been treating him to take a further look and give us an assessment,” an official told Cricbuzz.

Mathews will remain in Dhaka until the assessment is made. A call will be made on whether he will remain in Dhaka or fly back home on Friday morning. Top-order batsman Sadeera Samarawickrama has been kept on stand-by and will fly to Dhaka if necessary on Friday, but will not be available to play the game against Bangladesh. Either Danushka Gunathilaka or Niroshan Dickwella will come in as replacement for Mathews.

Mathews has been troubled by a series of calf, hamstring and ankle injuries since returning home early from the tour of South Africa in January last year. He missed the tour of Australia and the entire home series against Bangladesh.

He returned to action during Champions Trophy in June, but stepped down as captain from all forms of the game after a series defeat to Zimbabwe a month later. On the insistence of new head coach Chandika Hathurusingha, he agreed to take over ODI and T20I captaincy, but faces another lay off now.

The hamstring injury troubled him during the second T20I International against India in Indore in December. He missed the final game in Mumbai and was picked for the Bangladesh tour only as a specialist batsman. Chandimal will now be Sri Lanka’’s sixth ODI captain since July last year. — Cricbuzz.