Neither were expected to make it to the knockouts, but it was expected that they’d give a better account of themselves, considering the vast years of experience they have as well as the quality of players
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00:00 Hi, I'm Ayaz Memon with the World Cup Update. It's Sri Lanka vs Bangladesh. This is the battle of the laggards.
00:05 Both teams have been extremely disappointing in this tournament. Sri Lanka, because they were injury hit, but even so, they've been just so inconsistent.
00:15 And Bangladesh, I mean, there are so many stories swirling around of internecine problems, controversies, that they've just appeared so disjointed, disunited.
00:26 Lack of cohesion, very evident. They've had some fine performers, Mohammadullah notably, but not much else.
00:34 Saqibul Hasan, the captain and their best player, extremely disappointing. And for Sri Lanka, I thought Kusal Mendes played a superb knock.
00:42 Madhu Shankar has been one of those really good success stories for Sri Lanka, but did not have enough heft to seriously challenge any of the other teams.
00:52 I think they missed one Hindu, Hassaranga, but I thought they could still have put up a better show.
00:57 Now, why this match has become important, I mean, bottom of the pool is England. Both these teams are above England.
01:06 But neither wants to finish 10th or 9th, obviously, because 8 teams qualify automatically for the Champions Trophy.
01:16 Two teams will be bumped off from this list, and neither Sri Lanka nor Bangladesh would want that.
01:25 So that's really where the battle is. I mean, they're not playing for any great stakes in this tournament.
01:30 They're both out of contention for a place in the semifinals.
01:33 They're playing for pride, pride of performance, pride as professionals, and of course, to get into the Champions Trophy, as I said.
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