Sri Lanka batters drop like dominos in Asia Cup Final

Sri Lankan captain Chamari Athapaththu rued the batting collapse for the team's Asia Cup Final loss against India at the Sylhet International Cricket Stadium, on Saturday.

Athapaththu expressed her disappointment with the failure of the batting unit in Sri Lanka's first Asia Cup final appearance, since the inception of the tournament in 2004. She rued the fact that the team had a tough day on the ground and could not stick to their batting plans as a team. The Sri Lankan also was optimistic about the learnings from the tournament that they can apply at the T20 Women's World Cup, to be played in four months.

"Tough day as a team, not a good batting display in the finals and I'm really upset today. Next, we have the T20 World Cup and we learned a lot of things in this tournament and as a batting unit, we have to stick with our plans," expressed the captain.

Appreciative of the bowling department's performance, she said that the bowlers have performed exceptionally well and was cheerful about the young guns of the team who have performed better than expected.

"I'm really happy with my bowling unit. We have a couple of young players and hope they continue their performances as a batting unit. We do not have a lot of experienced players, but they are good players and I think they will play a lot of cricket in the future," Athapaththu said.

An all-round India crushed Sri Lanka by eight wickets in the final match of the Women's Asia Cup 2022, clinching their seventh title.

The day was extremely memorable for India as tight bowling from bowlers, Renuka Singh (3/5) in particular, restricted Sri Lanka to 65/9 in 20 overs. The target of 66 was chased down with very little inconvenience and Smriti Mandhana top-scored with an unbeaten 51* off 25 balls.