Hilal Suhaib
The Gaddafi Stadium in Lahore holds bitter sweet memories for Sri Lanka and its cricketers for it is at this venue that they won their biggest prize in world cricket the Cricket World Cup in 1996, suffered the harrowing experience of the national team bus being attacked by a dozen gunmen in 2009, and on Monday saw a young and inexperienced side sans the top guns bring the number one ranked Twenty20 international side Pakistan to their knees with comprehensive back to back wins that gave them a winning 2-0 lead in the ongoing three-match series – the first time they have beaten their opponents in a series in this format in a bilateral contest.
The victory in the T20I series came against all odds. When the team left for Karachi no one in their wildest of dreams would have put their money on Sri Lanka beating Pakistan on their own soil.
But yet this young and inexperienced bunch of cricketers under a new T20I captain Dasun Shanaka have turned the form book upside down by beating a full strength Pakistan side with a performance on the field that ranks among the best…