‘Sri Lanka will be a force to reckon with in World Cup’

DUBAI - Sri Lanka, who finished runners-up in the previous edition, have a good chance of winning the cricket World Cup for the second time, feels stylish batsman Mahela Jayawardene.

Jayawardene, who led Sri Lanka to the 2007 World Cup final in the West Indies, said the team’s approach in the next edition will be to take one match at a time. The World Cup kicks off Feb 19 in India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.

“I do not want to consider ourselves as favourites. We can be a force to be reckoned with,” said Mahela in a World Cup promotional event here Friday.

“We will just like to start slowly and concentrate on one game at a time. I know the conditions will help us, the crowd and home advantage and all that. But we can only control things on the field. We can just keep our focus on that. I think we have got a pretty good chance.”

Sri Lanka’s lone World Cup triumph came in 1996 when they beat Australia in the final in Lahore, Pakistan.

In the same event, Bangladesh captian Shakib Al Hasan spoke about his team’s preparation and the players to watch out for the mega event.

“I had a chat with Mashrafe (Mortaza) and he told me that he will be able to play after a month. It will take him four weeks to get back to the ground. I firmly believe he will be fit and that will be a great bonus for us.”

“Tamim Iqbal for the last one-and-half years has been in terrific form. Imrul Kayes has been the highest run-getter for Bangladesh last year. Mushfiqur Rahim is the other one who is improving and Abdur Razzak has been bowling really well,” he said.