South Africa’s cricket selectors on Monday named wicket-keeper Mark Boucher as captain for the limited-overs tri-series against India and hosts Sri Lanka next month. Boucher will lead a 14-man squad for the August 14 to 29 event, replacing Ashwell Prince who is captain for the ongoing Test series against Sri Lanka in place of the injured Graeme Smith.
At least nine soldiers and 35 Tamil rebels were killed on Monday in a major battle for control of a disputed waterway in north-eastern Sri Lanka, defence officials said. Nine troopers, including an officer, were killed in mortar bombs attacks while another 15 soldiers were wounded, officials said.
Muttiah Muralitharan took six second-innings wickets and 10 in the match to propel Sri Lanka to a crushing innings and 153-run win over South Africa in the first cricket Test. Resuming Monday on 311-4, South Africa were dismissed for 434 in the middle session of the final day.
Seam-bowler Dilhara Fernando and Muttiah Muralitharan took two wickets a piece on Sunday to boost Sri Lanka’s chances of a win in the first cricket Test against South Africa. Resuming day four at 43 without loss in its second innings, South Africa progressed to 311 for four wickets at stumps on the fourth day.
Mahela Jayawardene smashed the fourth-highest Test score of 374 and shared a world record stand of 624 with Kumar Sangakkara as Sri Lanka battered South Africa in the first Test on Saturday. The batting feast at the Sinhalese Sports Club saw Sri Lanka pile up a mammoth 756-5 declared in reply to South Africa’s modest 169 to gain a match-winning lead of 587 runs.
Sri Lanka’s Kumar Sangakkara and Mahela Jayawardene pulverised South Africa’s bowling with double centuries during a 471-run unbroken stand in the first Test on Friday. The overnight pair batted through the entire second day’s play as Sri Lanka amassed 485-2 in their first innings by stumps, a lead of 316 over South Africa’s meagre first innings total of 169.
Kumar Sangakkara and Mahela Jayawardene flogged the South African attack on the second morning to put Sri Lanka in command of the first cricket Test in Colombo on Friday. The left-handed Sangakkara scored his 10th Test century and captain Jayawardene was one run away from his 15th as Sri Lanka piled up 227-2 by lunch on the second day in reply to South Africa’s 169.
Muttiah Muralitharan and Dilhara Fernando combined to bowl out South Africa for 169, their lowest total against Sri Lanka, on the opening day of the first cricket Test on Thursday. The pace-spin duo claimed four wickets each as the depleted South Africans were shot out at the stroke of tea on an even-paced wicket at the Sinhalese Sports Club.
Injury-hit South Africa received unexpected support for the first Test against Sri Lanka starting in Colombo on Thursday from the man likely to cause them the biggest headache. Sri Lanka’s prolific spinner Muttiah Muralitharan said the Proteas will be tough to beat in the two-match series despite being crippled by the absence of three key players, including captain Graeme Smith.
Injury-hit South Africa were on Monday boosted by the news that veteran all-rounder Shaun Pollock will arrive in Sri Lanka later this week following the birth of his second child. The 33-year-old will reach Colombo on Thursday, missing the first of the two Test matches which starts at the Sinhalese sports club.
Bodies dumped in wells, dead children hung from rafters and underage boys abducted to fight. During two decades of civil war, such atrocities were commonplace in Sri Lanka but a ceasefire since 2002 halted the worst of the attacks on children.
South Africa’s first black cricket captain Ashwell Prince says his team is not worried about playing in violence-wracked Sri Lanka on the current tour. ”Prior to the tour, a team of security experts visited Sri Lanka and submitted their observations,” Prince told a media conference in Colombo late on Thursday.
South Africa, led by their first non-white captain Ashwell Prince, arrived in Sri Lanka on Wednesday to play two Tests and a one-day series also featuring India. The Proteas are depleted by the absence of regular captain Graeme Smith and star all-rounder Jacques Kallis, both of whom are injured.
Sri Lanka’s navy rained mortar shells on Tamil rebel positions in the island’s restive east on Friday, after suspected snipers killed one sailor and injured another as sporadic attacks raise fears of renewed war. The Tamil Tiger rebels said none of their fighters were killed by the mortars, but said they clashed with an army unit in their territory in the eastern district of Batticaloa,
A bitter battle to control Sri Lanka’s cricket establishment has wrecked the schedule for next month’s limited-overs tri-series against India and South Africa. The dispute, generated by upcoming elections at Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC), revolves around holding the first four matches of the August 14-29 tri-series in the central town of Dambulla.
Sri Lanka’s capital Colombo was thrown into panic on Friday after sonic booms caused by jet fighters were mistaken for bomb blasts off the coast, the military and police said. Defence Ministry spokesperson Prasad Samarasinghe said Israeli-built Kfir jets were on a training mission and may have broken the sound barrier causing people on the ground to hear loud blasts.
Sri Lanka’s president vowed on Friday not to allow the killing of 64 bus passengers derail the island’s peace process as the air force bombarded Tamil Tiger positions for a second straight day. President Mahinda Rajapakse insited the Norwegian-brokered process would not be allowed to collapse following Thursday’s Claymore mine attack on the bus.
Suspected Tamil Tiger rebels set off a powerful landmine in northern Sri Lanka on Thursday that killed at least 64 bus passengers and wounded another 45, a government minister said. The casualties were high as the bus was overcrowded with villagers travelling to the main town of Kebitigollewa to buy provisions.
Sri Lanka’s Tamil Tiger rebels denied involvement in Thursday’s bus bombing that killed at least 64 passengers and said the blast had been aimed at discrediting them. The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam rejected government charges that they carried out the morning attack near Kebitigollewa town in the North-Central Province and in turn pointed a finger at the government.
Sri Lanka’s key foreign aid donors will meet to reevaluate the troubled nation’s faltering peace process this week at a meeting in Tokyo as blood continues to be spilt in the south Asian nation. Japan’s peace envoy Yasushi Akashi is to host a meeting of the United States, the European Union and Norway in order to review their involvement in Sri Lanka’s faltering peace process.
Mine attacks killed two navy sailors and wounded two commandos in northern Sri Lanka on Thursday in the latest in a barrage of violence that is posing the biggest danger yet to the country’s four-year-old ceasefire. The bloodshed threatens to wreck a 2002 truce that ended two decades of fighting between the government and rebels.
Sri Lanka’s air force resumed retaliatory strikes against Tamil Tiger positions on Wednesday, police said amid fears that the country was sliding back to full-scale war after a four-year truce. Air attacks were carried out in the north-eastern district of Trincomalee where the military bombed a cluster of boats of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam on Tuesday night.
At least eight people were killed in two separate mine blasts in northern Sri Lanka on Monday, hours after Tiger rebels announced they are suspending participation in peace talks. The latest deaths raised to 64 the number of people, mostly police or troops, killed in bomb attacks in the past week in the latest surge of violence linked to the decades-old Tamil separatist conflict.
Two policemen died in a suspected Tamil Tiger mine attack in Sri Lanka on Wednesday, the third in as many days, raising to 21 the number of people killed in the latest wave of bombings, police said. The policemen were on their way to Trincomalee to buy provisions for colleagues stationed further north of the main city in the eastern coastal district when they were ambushed.
Imran Farhat and Younis Khan hit half-centuries as Pakistan thrashed Sri Lanka by eight wickets in the second and final Test here on Wednesday to clinch the series 1-0. The tourists faced no difficult chasing a 183-run target on the third day as left-handed opener Farhat (65) and Younis (73 not out) batted confidently to ensure victory with a 114-run stand for the second wicket.
A devastating spell by Mohammad Asif left Sri Lanka reeling on 73-8 in their second innings of the second cricket Test as the Pakistani seam bowler grabbed his first 10-wicket haul in a Test match. Coming in to bowl while his team were 109 runs behind in the second innings, Asif bowled Upul Tharanga (12), Kumar Sangakkara (16) and Thilan Samaraweera (4).
Pace bowler Mohammad Asif took his maiden five-wicket haul in Test cricket for Pakistan on Monday to restrict Sri Lanka to 267-8 wickets in their first innings at stumps on the first day of the second Test. After skipper Inzamam ul-Haq elected to bowl first after winning the toss, Asif bowled with accuracy, moving the ball both ways on a seaming pitch.
Sri Lanka’s cricket authorities are hopeful the tsunami-hit Galle International Stadium will be ready to host a Test match against South Africa in August. ”We have received a clearance from the government to rebuild the stadium,” said K Mathivanan, a member of Sri Lanka Cricket’s interim committee.
The Sri Lankan cricket board on Friday gave ace off-spinner Muttiah Muralitharan a car for becoming the first bowler to claim 1 000 wickets in international cricket. A host of dignitaries, past and present Sri Lankan players and the entire Pakistan team attended a function organised by Sri Lanka Cricket on Thursday to honour the prolific bowler.
Mohammad Yousuf scored a stylish half-century on Wednesday to propel Pakistan to a comfortable four-wicket win against Sri Lanka in the third limited-overs international and a series sweep. Yousuf backed up Shahid Afridi’s haul of 3-37, and knocks of 46 runs each by opening batsmen Shoaib Malik and Imran Farhat.
Sri Lanka on Tuesday accused Tamil Tiger rebels of conscripting more child soldiers despite pledges to end the internationally-condemned practice of enlisting underage combatants. The defence ministry in a statement accused the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam of abducting two schoolboys in the restive eastern district of Batticaloa on Monday.
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/ 27 January 2006
Sri Lanka’s key foreign backers welcomed on Friday an agreement by the Sri Lankan government and Tamil Tiger rebels to resume peace talks and urged them to work to halt violence. Japan praised Norway for breaking on Wednesday a three-year deadlock in the peace process by clinching a deal for the warring parties to meet face-to-face in Geneva by mid-February.