Sports
In Pakistan Tests, Sri Lanka Wants Another Shot At WTC
(CTN News) – Sri Lanka vs Pakistan was in the running for the World Test Championship final until March. In the new cycle, that prospect has whetted its appetite.
In the first test of this campaign, Sri Lanka will play Pakistan in Galle on Sunday in the first of two matches to follow.
During the last World Test Championship, we had a pretty good campaign and at one point we had a chance to make it to the final,” Sri Lanka skipper Dimuth Karunaratne said after the final match.
We would have liked to finish things off better, but our last series in New Zealand didn’t go as well as we had hoped. There are a number of reasons to be looking forward to this challenge, but we are looking forward to it.”
Left-arm quick Shaheen Afridi returns from an injury which kept him out of the test team for a year, and Pakistan will be hoping he can bring their team to victory.
As a result of a serious injury sustained while fielding in the second innings last year, Afridi did not appear in the remainder of the match when these two teams played at the same ground.
He suffered an injury at the T20 World Cup a few months later that aggravated the injury even further. The first test was won by Pakistan, but the second test was lost by them.
This year they will be mirroring the same series that they did last year.
Pakistan skipper Babar Azam said that he was glad to see Shaheen Afridi back on the field. Besides his wicket-taking skills, he is always able to motivate and lift the team by his presence. Shaheen is on 99 test wickets and in a position to become the fourth fastest Pakistani quick to reach 100 test wickets in the shortest time possible.
I know he has missed red-ball cricket and is hungry for test cricket.”
The country will be without the services of seam bowler Asitha Fernando, who has been diagnosed with dengue fever and is recovering from it.
Vishwa Fernando and Kasun Rajitha are expected to share the new ball, despite the fact that they have in their squad uncapped left-arm quick Dilshan Madushanka, who was highly impressive during the Asia Cup last year, when he took wickets that included Virat Kohli.
As for Sri Lanka’s key weapon, it will be left-arm spinner Prabath Jayasuriya, who has already taken 46 wickets in five tests in Galle, including six five-wicket hauls, which is an enviable record in Galle.
Despite the fact that both teams have settled their sides, Pakistan still carries 13 players who were in Sri Lanka twelve months ago in their squad.
There is also a chance that the tourists will see their fortunes improve during the series. In the first 10 tests that Pakistan has played since the start of 2022, it has only won one of them.
While it is ranked sixth in the world, it is one place higher than Sri Lanka in terms of the ranking system.
How many matches are there in Pakistan vs Sri Lanka?
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