Sydney, Oct. 22: Sri Lankan vice-captain Mahela Jayawardene believes that next month’s one-day series against Australia may be his team’s best chance ever to achieve a breakthrough series win on Australian soil.
Since playing their first international clash in Australia in 1984-85, Sri Lanka has never won a Test or limited-overs series Down Under.
“We’ve improved quite a bit in the last couple of years and our away form is pretty good, that’s something we’ve always been trying to improve,” the Sydney Morning Herald quoted Jayawardene, as saying.
“I think it’s a great opportunity for us. It’s going to be a bit tough for (Australia), with a bit of a hectic schedule. Some of them will be fresh and some of them won’t be fresh, but Australia is Australia,” he added.
Sri Lanka will play a three-match ODI series during their short tour of Australia.
The first match will be played on November 3 at Melbourne, followed by second on November 5 at Sydney and third on November 7 at Brisbane.
Sangakkara slams century
Meanwhile, in Brisbane, skipper Kumar Sangakkara hammered 110 off 95 balls as the tourists blazed to a score of 301 on their way to a 112-run win over Queensland in their opening Australian tour match on Friday.
The Sri Lankans, building up to their three-match one-day international series with Australia next month, were spearheaded by Sangakkara and Chamara Silva (75) at the Gabba
The tourists then dismissed Queensland for 189 off 36.1 overs with paceman Dilhara Fernando taking 4/41 off 6.1 overs and fellow fast bowler Dammika Prasad snaring 3/43 off eight overs.
Sangakkara was heartened by the way his team started on one of Australia’s bounciest wickets but said they had plenty of important work ahead of them with a one-dayer and T20 against New South Wales before taking on Australia.
“We still have a lot of improvement (left) but I like the way we batted especially getting through the start in the first 12 overs,” he said.