Mohammad Rizwan and Abdullah Shafique centuries helped Pakistan to get their second victory of the tournament. They beat Sri Lanka by 6 wickets.
A day to the centuries where four centuries were scored earlier by Mendis and Samarawickrama and later by Rizwan and Shafique.
Lankans posted 344/9 in 50 overs and in reply Pakistan chased down the target in 48.2 overs and scored 345/4.
After winning the toss, Sri Lanka opted to bat first.
Kusal Perera again showed disappointment with the bat and without scoring any runs he departed back to the pavilion. After that a solid partnership built between Pathum Nissanka (51 runs) and Kusal Mendis (122 runs) of 102 runs. Nissanka played a great supporter and hit 7 fours and a six in his inning.
Then Sadeera Samarawickrama (108 runs) played a brilliant knock with Mendis and scored 111 runs together. Mendis again batted brilliantly and his destructiveness was again seen in this match also. He took 77 balls and hit 14 fours and 6 sixes with a strike rate of 158.44. Sadeera on the other hand started a little defensive and after setting it down he batted aggressively and played 89 balls in which he hit 11 fours and 2 sixes.
After their departure to the pavilion lower middle order didn’t contribute much with the bat and finally they posted 344 runs on the board by the loss of 9 wickets in 50 overs.
Pakistani bowlers after losing rhythm bowled superbly in the death overs as they restricted the team since they were looking approx 370-380. Hasan Ali got 4 wickets. Haris Rauf after getting some bhasing in the start of his spells got 2 wickets at the end. Shaheen Afridi, Mohammad Nawaz and Shadab Khan got 1 wicket each.
Pakistan was struggling during the starting phase and lost 2 early wickets. Babar Azam (10 runs) again failed to contribute. Then Abdullah Shafique (113 runs) who was playing in place of Fakhar Zaman registered his first century in international cricket and that too in a World Cup must be memorable for him. He sorted the opening for the team as Fakhar was struggling with his batting.
He along with Mohammad Rizwan (131 runs) put up a record partnership of 176 runs for the 3rd wicket. Shafique in his innings hit 10 fours and 3 sixes, whereas Rizwan hit 8 boundaries and 3 sixes. Rizwan remained unbeaten at the end and he along with Saud Shakeel (31 runs ) and Iater with Iftikhar Ahmed (22 runs) chased down the target easily with 10 balls to spare and score 345 runs by losing 4 wickets.
Dilshan Madushanka delivered 2 early wickets but later he couldn’t get any more wickets in the later half of his spell. Matheesha Pathirana again conceded 90 runs and took only 1 wicket. Maheesh Theekshana in his comeback match got 1 wicket.
Mohammad Rizwan, Pakistan, Player of the Match
“Always a proud moment for me whenever you perform for your country. I am speechless at this moment. It was difficult. The thing was that after the bowling innings we went back and everyone was confident. Unluckily, they got Babar Azam early but we got good partnerships after that. It’s a good track, it was supporting us. I told Shafique to take it step by step. Sometimes I had cramps and sometimes I was okay.”