Canada and ground are a mystery to Sri Lanka

John Davison

COLOMBO, (Reuters) – Joint hosts Sri Lanka will be  venturing into the unknown in every way despite “home advantage”  when they meet Canada in their World Cup opener at Hambantota on  Sunday.
Sri Lanka captain Kumar Sangakkara admitted that his team  was unfamiliar with the pitch and conditions at Hambantota and  they knew very little about the opposition who ran England close  in a 16-run defeat in their warm-up on Wednesday.
Several attempts were made by Sri Lanka Cricket to get the  venue ready ahead of time to enable Sri Lanka to play a few  matches ahead of the World Cup but logistical delays and rain  prevented that from happening.

John Davison
John Davison

“The worst thing is you are nervous and afraid to go out and  do what you know you can do. That’s the biggest thing you have  to be careful of,” said Sangakkara.
“If you play as well as you know how to play you always make  it that much harder for the opposition to beat you.
“Some days you can play the best cricket and still lose the  game but the point is to keep playing your best cricket  consistently through this tournament.
“There’s no point complaining about things we can’t control  but make sure we are focused to play cricket,” he said. The  Lankan captain said that he knew very little about Canada.
“John Davison scored the fastest World Cup hundred otherwise  we don’t know too much about Canada,” said Sangakkara.
“We have tried to get as much footage as we can of them.  When we go to play sides that we haven’t played we have got to  worry, because in those games it’s all about us. How well we do  and how well we play our cricket.
“If we do that not to our fullest potential but touch the  standards we know we can, we should be able to beat that  opposition.
“If you get too negative and worry too much it won’t be  good. Do the best you can and make sure that best is good enough  to win,” he said.
Sri Lanka and Canada have met only once in a one-day  international in the 2003 World Cup match played at Paarl.  Canada were shot out for 36, the second lowest total in one-day  internationals.
It was the shortest match played in World Cup history  lasting just 23.2 overs in total with Sri Lanka winning with  nine wickets in hand inside five overs.