Consolation victory for Sri Lankan juniors

Jeevan Mendis with an all-round performance helped Sri Lankan Under-19 to earn their first win against Pakistan Under-19 in the final fifth one-dayer by seven wickets at the Gaddafi Stadium Tuesday.

Pakistan Under-19 won the series 4-1. The home side put into the bat first was skittled out for a paltry total of 126 in 46.3 overs. In reply, the Sri Lankans overhauled the winning target comfortably scoring 129 for three due to an all round performance by Jeevan Mendis, jointly declared the Man-ofthe-Match with Kamran Sajid in the fourth match at thesame venue, took three wickets for 14 runs and then scored unbeaten29 to claim the award again.

He received a cash prize of $ 300 from the Sri Lankan High Commissioner in Pakistan General C.S Weera Sooriya who was the chief guest. Kamran Sajid was declared the best player of the series and was awarded $ 500.

Pakistan Under-19 team got a cash prize of Rs 1,00,000 for winning the series while the Sri Lankan Under-19 got Rs 50,000.

To give exposure to more players Pakistan made nine changes in the team which had won the fourth one-dayer by one wicket at the same venue on Monday.

Chasing the target, Sri Lankan lost the openers U Tharanga for a duck. The next man S Perera (32) joined the other opener K Gunawardene (14) and both took the total to 51 in 55 minutes to repair the early damage. But after Gunawardene's departure at the total of 51, S Perera also followed suit with the total at 71. Their dismissals brought Jeevan Mendis (29) and P Ranawaka (26) together.

They started their march towards the victory target to eventually get it after 31.5 overs. Ranawaka hit a boundary off leg-spinner Azam Husain to complete the win.

Mendis struck five fours and faced only 33 deliveries during 44 minutes stay at the crease. Ranawaka laced his knock with three fours and one six. He negotiated with 60 balls during his unbeaten stay of 70 minutes. The unbroken fourth wicket stand yielded 58 runs in 44 minutes.

Despite defending a poor total, the Pakistani bowlers bowled 23 wide balls in which paceman Junaid Zia contributed the major shareof 17.

Earlier from the home side only opener Ariz Kamal (41, two fours in 101 balls) and Mohammad Fayyaz (39, six fours off 58 balls) were the major scorers. They added 69 valuable runs for the fourth wicket in 58 minutes which enabled the Pakistan Juniors recover, after losing their first three wickets with only 16 runs on the board.

After the dismissal of these two, no other batsmen could stay at the wicket for a big innings and the entire team wasback in dressing room for only 126 runs in 46.3 overs.

Leg-spinner Jeevan Mendis and paceman D Prasad, took three wickets each for 14 and 23, runs respectively. Off-spinner L Fernando chipped in with two wickets for 15.