Sri Lanka’s chances of automatic qualification for this year’s ODI World Cup are remote. If South Africa win their two ODIs against Netherlands, they will have 98 Super League points, which will be a tally out of Sri Lanka’s reach. The most likely course of events is that Sri Lanka will have to play the qualifiers in Zimbabwe in June and July this year.
For much of this Super League cycle, they have played like a side that does not deserve automatic qualification. The only major series in which they surpassed expectation was a 3-2 win at home against Australia last year, but that didn’t count towards the Super League.
As was the case on Saturday, the batting order is one of Sri Lanka’s major problems. New Zealand bowled them out for 76 at Eden Park, and that was the second successive game in which the team total did not reach 80; they had been bowled out for 73 in January by India, who had amassed 390 for 5 in the same match.ar. But after 65 ODIs, de Silva averages just 26.28 and has a strike rate of only 78 in this format. Thus, there is little evidence of his being a game-changing batter.
New Zealand, meanwhile, can ensure they finish at the top of the Super League table with one more victory. This is mainly for bragging rights, and a validation of their excellent ODI form over the past three years, though they did lose their last series 3-0 in India – that wasn’t part of the Super League either.
Mainly, though, the second ODI against Sri Lanka in Christchurch will be another audition for those pressing for World Cup spots. Henry Shipley‘s five-wicket haul to win the first game will have caught the selectors’ eyes, while Finn Allen’s 51 and Rachin Ravindra’s 49 from lower down the order will also have impressed.
New Zealand are getting to the fine-tuning stage of their World Cup preparation; Sri Lanka have huge holes in their game to address.
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