Australia will take on the Sri Lanka in the eighth game of the Super Eight stage of the ICC World T20 that will be played at Barbados. The two sides had earlier won the first game that they had played and that means that the winner of this game will almost be certain to go through to the semi-finals. On the other hand, the losing team will be with one win, the same as the winner of the game between India and West Indies and that will mean that the games on the last day will become very crucial.

Australia had unleashed their pace attack like it was a wicket at the WACA against India and got the Indian batsmen hopping and jumping against them. This will not change for sure and that against a side which is from the sub-continent, and will find the going as difficult as the Indians did. Again, the thing to be noted is that the Australia pace men are not those who can hit the 135 km/hr-140 km/hr mark on a regular basis, but those whose pace will go beyond even the 150 km/hr mark on occasions.

That does mean that the sides against them will look to make the most of the spinner in their rank, Steve Smith, and that will mean that there is a good chance that he may get the chance to pick up wickets as well.

From the Sri Lankan point of view, there cannot be too much doubt that they will be happy with the way in Kumar Sangakkara played in the game against West Indies. Quite simply, before that, the Sri Lankan batting was totally dependent on the shoulders of Mahela Jayawardene and that meant that the side was not getting any kind of starts. With Tillakaratne Dilshan out of form, the side did manage to change things around and got Sanath Jayasuriya at the top of the innings, but there was no change in the way the side went about their starts. Jayasuriya was dismissed early and had it not been for the two stalwarts, it would have been much more painful.

For Dilshan, the life seems to be coming a full circle, as he was a middle order batsman who then shifted to opening the innings and got immense success. Now, with consistent failures, he is back to his middle order position.

Australia hold all the aces going into the game, but it is also certain that Sri Lanka will look to befuddle them with Ajantha Mendis and Muralitharan in tow.

Tag :- Ajantha Mendis   Australia   Kumar Sangakkara   Mahela Jayawardene   Sri Lanka