• Lankans confident before today's final

Lankans confident before today's final
By Channaka de Silva

The weather seems to be reaching its perfect best and so are the Sri Lankan cricketers as the final of the cricket tournament 'Nidahas Trophy' celebrating the golden jubilee of their independence takes place today between India and Sri Lanka at Premadasa stadium as a day-night fixture. Rainy weather which ruined five out of the preliminary round's nine games seemed to be taking break for the past three days as bright sun shine greeted the metropolis.

AWESOME - Tendulkar at full flow could demolish any bowler

Meanwhile, the island cricketers just two days ago showed touches of the kind of form which brought the tiny nation the world cup in 1996 while thrashing New Zealand in the final league round match to set themselves up for the finals in confident style.

Having won all three of their matches after beginning the tournament on a sour note when they lost to India in the curtain raiser, Sri Lankan morale will be high when they enter the Premadasa Stadium today. That defeat to India was their first loss in four years on home soil.

The amazing from of opener Sachin Tendulkar is the major factor which now stands between the locals and the cup. Sri Lankans will be much relieved to see the back of Tendulkar early today and if they do not, it will be a lop sided victory for the Indians because such is the form of the master batsman that he could instill fear into any international attack.

But Sri Lankans could take heart of the fact that their own maestro Aravinda de Silva, probably the only man on the planet to match Tendulkar, is shaping up well to reach his best. Despite scoring three half centuries and a 48 in the four innings he played, de Silva is still short of his smashing best as anybody who watched him could say. But the man who scored a brilliant century in the World Cup final could come up with a match winning knock today as everybody knows that he saves the best for last.

The arrival of Arjuna Ranatunga to his best form with a century also signalled a plus factor for the Lankans. But batting has never been a worry for the Lankans on home pitches and they continued to make merry during the tournament.

But as always the case is, bowling department had been suspect. The inclusion of raw fast medium bowler Suresh Perera who got hammered mercilessly has not helped the things a bit.

But just well, all rounder Sanath Jayasuriya's left arm spin bowling is becoming increasingly effective which eases the burden of the locals.

Indians are also a very strong batting side and it is a very difficult task to get through the in-form men such as Tendulkar, Saurav Ganguly, Mohammed Azharuddin and Ajay Jadeja.

Spin bowling has always been India's strength but excellent young medium pacer Ajit Agarkar whose bowling has been outstanding could well be the difference between the two sides today.

• TEAMS (FROM) :
• SRI LANKA -- Arjuna Ranatunga (captain), Aravinda de Silva (vice captain), Sanath Jayasuriya, Romesh Kaluwitharana, Marvan Atapattu, Roshan Mahanama, Upul Chandana, Kumara Dharmasena, Pramodya Wickremasinghe, Suresh Perera, Muttiah Muralitharan, Niroshan Bandaratilleke, Avishka Gunawardena, Mahela Jayawardena.

• INDIA -- Mohammad Azharuddin (captain), Ajay Jadeja (vice captain), Sachin Tendulkar, Saurav Ganguly, Robin Singh, Hrishikesh Kanitkar, Nayan Mongia, Ajit Agarkar, Anil Kumble, Venkatesh Prasad, Harbajan Singh, Debasis Mohanty, Gagan Khoda, Rahul Sanghvi.

• UMPIRES -- K.T. Francis, Peter Manuel. THIRD UMPIRE -- B.C. Cooray STAND BY - Ignatius Anandappa.