Reigning champions let the trophy slip through their fingers

Sri Lanka (153/5) beat New Zealand (150/6) by five wickets

• Devine and Melie Kerr provide solid batting platform for New Zealand

• Poor final two overs leave New Zealand on under-par 150/6

• Illing drops match-winner de Silva on 1

• Sri Lanka claim the win in the final over

• Reigning champions on the brink 

In a disastrous day at Southampton, reigning champions New Zealand let their crown slip through their fingers with an abject display in which they underperformed with the bat, the ball, and most glaringly, in the field.

The White Ferns won the toss and decided to bat. Having lost Izzy Gaze from the 3^rd ball of the day, Georgia Plimmer and Melie Kerr dug in well, adding 49 runs before Plimmer’s departure brought in Sophie Devine, enabling New Zealand’s two global superstars to bat together. They immediately set to work in trying to dismantle Sri Lanka’s bowling attack, adding five boundaries and scampering numerous singles and twos to accumulate 43 runs from only 25 balls.

Devine’s presence at the wicket remained New Zealand’s best hope of posting a substantial score, and she continued to punish anything short or wide with muscular relish. A huge six over deep mid-wicket moved her score to 45 as the innings approached its penultimate over, however, trying to repeat the shot, Devine was caught on the boundary by Nilakshi de Silva and New Zealand’s innings petered out, taking only 11 runs from the final two overs, giving them a total of 150/6, which felt 10-15 runs light.

Sri Lanka’s reply began cautiously as Bree Illing and Rosemary Mair were getting the ball to nip around, Illing shaping the ball in nicely. Chamari Athapaththu and Vishmi Gunaratne sprung into life in the final two overs of the powerplay, a flurry of boundaries advancing the score from a pedestrian 16/0 to a much more respectable 45/0 in the space of 10 balls before Gunaratne was dismissed in comical fashion, her steepling hoick to long on going straight through the hands of the clearly terrified Georgia Plimmer, but somehow nestling in her lap as she fell to the ground.

Throughout the innings, New Zealand’s fielding was shocking, with the exception of Melie Kerr’s magnificent run out of Hasini Perera, sprinting out to the vacant extra cover area to field her own bowling, then running her opponent out with a direct hit.

However, of more significance, it turned out, was the terrible drop of a dolly catch by Bree Illing when Nilakshi de Silva had scored 1 run. A top edge from the bowling of Melie Kerr fell gently into her hands and then out again – truly a metaphor of New Zealand’s disastrous title defence.

Having reached 60/4 after 10 overs, Sri Lanka needed to get a move on without losing more wickets if they were to stand any chance of winning. The fact that they managed this was due in no small part to the reprieved de Silva. At the end of the 15^th over, with still 46 runs needed, de Silva was responsible for the comedy run out of her partner, Kavisha Dilhari. Dilhari was livid. De Silva was distraught. But ironically, this passage of play helped turn the game in Sri Lanka’s favour.

Kaushani Nuthyangana came in and struck 24 runs from 14 balls, a much better strike rate than Dilhari had been achieving. Mair, Illing and Melie Kerr all delivered expensive overs in the final phase of the match, meaning that Sophie Devine was left to defend 5 runs from the final over. When Nuthyangana carved the 4^th ball through the leg side for 4, it was all over. Sri Lanka had defeated the reigning champions. And although they are not mathematically out of the competition, it is very difficult to imagine a scenario in which they qualify for the semi-finals.

It was a desperately disappointing performance by New Zealand – they would have been hoping to prove the doubters wrong and improbably defend their World T20 crown. I’m afraid the doubters have been proved right on this occasion.