Sri Lanka's blow hot and cold batting – a recipe for disaster in T20 World Cup

■ Batting continues to be Achilles' heel ■ Lack of cricket sense the downfall

- BY SA'ADI THAWFEEQ

Unless Sri Lanka's pathetic batting is addressed, it is not going to help them at all in the T20 World Cup

NOT for the first time this year have we seen Sri Lanka collapse from a strong position to hand to the opposition a T20I game on a platter.

What happened in the final of the T20 Tri-Series against Pakistan was unpardonable. One moment Sri Lanka were riding high at 81-1 at the halfway mark and looking towards setting Pakistan a challenging total to chase. But in the blink of an eye, they were all back in the dugout, dismissed for 114 without using up their entire quota of overs, losing eight wickets for 16 runs.

As long as Kamil Mishara and Kusal Mendis were in the middle, Sri Lanka's hopes of getting to a decent total looked a possibility. But when Mendis fell for 14, bringing to an end a partnership of 64, the rest of the batting simply fell apart like a pack of cards. If not for Mishara's half-century, Sri Lanka's plight could have been even worse.