AUS vs SL: Australia Under Pressure With Poor NRR As They Lock Horns Against Sri Lanka In ICC T20 World Cup 2022

Australia suffered a big loss in their ICC T20 World Cup 2022 opening fixture after being beaten profoundly by New Zealand. Following the result, the NRR of the defending champions has plummeted to an appalling -4.45. Sri Lanka on the other hand, having thrashed Ireland have a NRR of 2.467.

NRRs only come into play if teams are on equal points ahead of the semi-finals and with the competition being fierce NRRs will weigh on teams’ minds. Sides like Australia, who ordinarily are expected to beat Sri Lanka on home tracks, will have that little extra inkling of pressure upon them and will need to beat the Islanders by a big margin to make amends for the loss against NZ.

Sri Lanka has better spinners than Australia on paper

In Wanindu Hasaranga, Maheesh Theekshana, and Dhananjaya de Silva, the Asia Cup 2022 winners have better spinners than Australia. While Sri Lanka will be content with just winning, on paper, they don’t win a lot of battles. They don’t have a pace attack of the quality of Mitchell Starc, Pat Cummins, and Josh Hazlewood.

And while Kusal Mendis looks as if he is working himself up to serious form, Sri Lanka’s middle order did not put up strong stats in the qualifiers. They are heavily dependent on those 8-12 overs of spin.

Sri Lanka stars need to align and deliver if they need to beat Australia

Contrarily, Australia’s openers are their top scorers this year. However, they have hurt Sri Lanka many times before and will be confident of taking down the opposition’s novice seam attack.

If Sri Lanka has to stage an upset, some of their stalwarts will need to align. The likes of Dasun Shanaka and Bhanuka Rajapaksa may have to produce the kinds of innings they did in the recent Asia Cup, which Sri Lanka won. Sri Lanka’s inexperienced seamers will need to perform beyond expectation also.

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