Australia win Super Over after Hazlewood heroics, take 2-0 lead against SL
Fast bowler concedes five runs in Super Over after picking up three wickets; Nissanka’s 73 goes in vain
Australia 164 for 6 (Inglis 48, Chameera 2-30, Theekshana 2-33) tied with Sri Lanka 164 for 8 (Nissanka 73, Shanaka 34, Hazlewood 3-22)
Australia win the Super Over
There’s no way Sri Lanka had a shot in this, right? With four overs left, they were five down needing 50. With three overs left, they were six down needing 46. Pathum Nissanka was playing the best innings of his T20 international career, but that career was only 14 matches old.
But with the help of Wanindu Hasaranga, Nissanka lurched Sri Lanka forward in the 18th over, bowled by Pat Cummins. Hasaranga hit two fours – one an intentional uppercut behind square, the other a thick outside edge. Nissanka then walloped Cummins over deep midwicket for six, and by the end of the over, Sri Lanka had brought the requirement to 29 off 12 balls.
But Josh Hazlewood kept the runs in check in the 19th over, giving away only 10, and he would thwart Sri Lanka again, later.
The final over, bowled by Marcus Stoinis, seemed to be going Australia’s way, when Nissanka was caught at deep backward square, and Sri Lanka still needed 12 off the last three balls, with only tailenders on strike.
Perhaps buoyed by the news of their big IPL contracts, though, Maheesh Theekshana and Dushmantha Chameera hit the boundaries that levelled the scores and force a Super Over. Theekshana bashed his first ball over deep midwicket, where Steven Smith almost pulled off a stunning save, but didn’t quite manage to prevent a six. Last ball of conventional play, Dushmantha Chameera smoked one down the ground for four to tie the scores. If the ball in between, a fullish ball way outside off stump, had been called a wide as it should have been, Sri Lanka might have won the game there.
The visitors did well to force the match into overtime, but that is where their fight ran out. Australia won it easy, in the end.