Somerset score historic victory over Sri Lanka

Somerset crowned a glorious six days of limited over cricket when they beat Sri Lanka by 63 runs at the County Ground in Taunton today, to record their third one day win in succession.

After winning the toss and batting first, openers Ian Blackwell and Peter Bowler put on 41, before Blackwell was out for 27. Bowler and Matt Wood followed shortly afterwards and then with the score on 75 Rob Turner was out.

At this point of the game the innings looked threatened, but once again it was Mike Burns, who was captain for the day and Keith Parsons who came to the rescue, sharing a fifth wicket stand of 84 and taking the score on to 159 , before Burns was out for 63, an innings that contained 1x6 and 7x4's.

Keith Parsons stayed until he saw his own half century up before he was out, and despite some lusty blows from Matt Bulbeck who hit one gigantic six into the Ian Botham Stand, Somerset were eventually all out for 241.

When Sri Lanka batted they got off to the worst of starts when opener Sanath Jayasuriya was trapped LBW by Matt Bulbeck off the second ballof the innings. Bulbeck struck again with the score on 16 when he accounted for Gunawardene in the same manner.

Silva and Kumar Sangakarra took the score onto 75 before Sangakarra was caught at the wicket by Rob Turner off Steffan Jones for 33.

Silva and Mahela Jayawardena then brought up the hundred , but with the score on 126 Keith Dutch tempted Silva (25) who gave a catch to Rob Turner.

From this situation Sri Lanka never really covered, and were all out for 178 in the 42nd over to give Somerset a deserved victory by 63 runs.

After the game Somerset coach Kevin Shine told me: "I'm very very pleased, this was an excellent all round performance, against Sri Lanka who are one of the best one day sides in the world. We fought our way back into the game from 70 for 4, and then we squeezed them when they batted and just kept on getting wickets."

He added; "Three one day victories on the trot has done our confidence the world of good, and is just what we needed."

Chief Executive Peter Anderson said: "Of course we are very pleased with the result, and all credit must go to our players. But we are very disappointed with number of people who turned out to watch such an historic victory. Where was everybody today!"