We didn't just play as a team, we played as a family - Dinesh Chandimal
Updated - 19 Feb 2018, 01:17 PM
Dinesh Chandimal, skipper of the Sri Lankan cricket team feels his team has begun to gel as a unit. Notably, Sri Lanka defeated Bangladesh by 75 runs to win the T20I series.
Further, Chandimal believes this will give them confidence in the upcoming fixtures. Also, Sri Lanka has played some good cricket in 2018 under their new coach Chandika Hathurusingha.
Sri Lanka’s comeback:
Sri Lanka made an astonishing turnaround after underperforming to a quite extent last year. So far, Sri Lanka has tasted success so far with the latest being the clean sweep over Bangladesh in the T20I series.
The win in the Tri-nation series, involving Zimbabwe and the hosts, was the beginning of their turnaround. Further, the defeated Bangladesh 1-0 in the two-match Test series and the subsequent T20I one.
However, they came to Dhaka on the back of 23 defeats in 29 ODIs in 2017 and eight successive losses in T20Is.
Further, they had injury woes with Angelo Mathew getting sidelined with an injury.
Dinesh Chandimal feels the team is playing as a family:
Chandimal feels that the players are getting back their confidence and the team has a good balance of experience and youngsters.
“I think now players are getting some confidence and trust and that is the main thing,” Chandimal said. “We had a really bad couple of years. We didn’t just play as a team, we played as a family,” he added.
“We’ve got a good mix of seniors and youngsters now and that is the main thing[ behind the success]” he said, particularly singling out Kusal Mendis. Meanwhile, Mendis notches up two back-to-back centuries and cementing his place as an opener.
“Before this tour, Mendis hasn’t played much as an opener. He played a couple of matches as an opener at the very start of his career, and after that, he batted at 3 and 4. On this tour, we had a chat we thought that he was a suitable opener, and we can get the right-hand/left-hand combination at the same time. I think he grabbed all the opportunities. That was really good. Now, there is so much competition in our team. That’s a really good sign,” Chandimal concluded.
Next up for Sri Lanka is the T20 Nidahas Trophy, which marks their 70 years of independence. This tournament will also include India and Bangladesh in the second-half of March.
Further, here is the newsfeed:
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