Captain Kumar Sangakkara and Srilankan Lion Dilshan hit robust half-centuries as Sri Lanka sent Australia packing from the World T20 with a six-wicket (with 6 ball remaining) win.
Australia to bat first by Sangakkara in his first match as captain, Australia managed only 159-9 in good batting conditions as mystery fast bowler Lasith Malinga& spinner Ajantha Mendis claimed three wickets each.
Tillakaratne Dilshan slams another fourOpener Dilshan then plundered 53 off 32 balls and Skipper Sangakkara made an unbeaten 55 to fire Lankans home with six deliveries to spare. At the end Jehan Mubarak hit 21 not out to keep his captain company till the end, which came when Mitchell Johnson sent down a wide off the first delivery of the final over.
Australia troop off the field and out of the tournamentSri Lanka were playing their first international match since the terror attack on their team bus in the Pakistani city of Lahore on March 3 which left seven players injured and killed eight Pakistani security men.
Sri Lanka captain Kumar Sangakkara: "It was a great performance - the key when you play a team like Australia is to believe you can win. We've got a variety of bowlers - we played two guys the Australians hadn't seen much before in Mendis and Udana, and we kept rotating the bowlers so they couldn't get used to anyone. Dilshan has been getting a lot of runs for us at the top of the order - the key was Mubarak coming in and hitting a quickfire 20"
Australia captain Ricky Ponting: "We got off to a reasonable start, and 160 was a pretty good effort, but we made too many mistakes with the ball - we bowled too many no-balls, I don't know how many runs were scored off the extra balls. And when you make mistakes against good players, you get punished. When we've tried to execute something, we haven't been able to do it. We've got to change things - whether it's personnel I'm not sure"
