CWC23: England suffer fourth defeat in five games, World Cup campaign all but over

Coming into this game, England were languishing in eighth on the points table having registered a solitary win from their first four games in the tournament. They needed a victory to keep their chances of reaching six wins out of nine afloat, but were instead handed a drubbing by Sri Lanka by eight wickets who finished the run-chase in less than 26 overs.

Batting first, England could only manage to put 156 on the board as regular wickets meant their innings went nowhere. While some of the wickets were the result of brilliance on the field, a lot of them were also down to the self-destructive antics of the English batters. Joe Root ran himself out early in the innings, while Adil Rashid was caught napping at the non-striker’s end towards the end as Kusal Mendis threw down the stumps to catch him short.

Ben Stokes tried his best to take England to a respectable total, but could only do so much as he holed out at deep mid-wicket for 43, becoming the eighth wicket to fall for England in the 31st over.

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In their reply, Sri Lanka stuttered a bit early on as David Willey got some movement in the air. He first deceived Kusal Perera, followed by his namesake Kusal Mendis to leave Sri Lanka 23-2. Another wicket or two and panic would have started to set in, but the duo of Pathum Nissanka and Sadeera Samarawickrama ensured that Sri Lanka sailed through without any more hiccups.

Apart from Willey, none of the other England bowlers had any impact as Nissanka finished the game off with a six towards long on off Rashid.

With this defeat, England’s chances of making it to the semi-finals have come down to a mathematical possibility only and not a realistic one as they’d need to win all four of their remaining games and hope that other results go their way.

Sri Lanka, on the other hand, have jumped to fifth on the table with this victory, with four points from five games.