Mahela Jayawardene has a lot of respect for India’s young guns, and the way they are shaping up under Mahendra Singh Dhoni. But the Sri Lankan captain is insistent that if his team bats to potential, it can throw up the tri-series wide open.

“There’s a lot of energy in that Indian team, and opposition teams are adjusting to them,” Jayawardene told newsmen on Monday morning. “The challenge for them is to be consistent and the challenge for us is to challenge ourselves.

“It’s all a matter of competing on the day and if you don’t, things go wrong for you. We just need to come back from the last outing and play to our positives. Our batting is a bit of concern. There are no excuses for the way we batted (against Australia in Sydney). The application wasn't good, we need to show some character. We think we can win the next four or five games in a row and get ourselves into that final. We been through such situations before; the important thing is to come back strongly.”

Tight competition

Eyeing a win on the morrow to make the tri-series a tight competition, Jayawardene remarked, “India’s win yesterday has opened things up now. If we win tomorrow, everyone has got one win each.

“We need to make sure that we give our best shot tomorrow and make this tournament much more interesting.”
Praising India’s effort against the Aussies on Sunday, he continued, “They bowled really well up front to put pressure on the Aussies and  batted well under tough conditions. They have been bowling really well in the past few weeks. In the Test matches, they showed good form. But it in a one-day game, you need to perform on that day. If you don't perform on that given day, you can be beaten.”

The Lankans kicked off their preparations for the tri-series with a win against the PM’s XI here a fortnight back.

“It was a good outing against a good opposition. Having played a game here and knowing the conditions and the wicket, it probably gives us a little bit of an advantage,” noted Jayawardene, perhaps unaware that India too played a three-day game at the Manuka Oval a month back. “The wicket looks a bit brown, rolled in. It looks a very hard, solid wicket, a good one-day track.”

His take on whether the Australians are more vulnerable now than ever before in the recent past? “Australia are not dominating world cricket at the moment,” he replied. “Yes, they are playing some good cricket, but on and off. They are being pushed to the limit, which is a good thing. I think the rest of the world is catching up to them, especially in one-day cricket.”