THE Zimbabwe national cricket team agonisingly went down to Sri Lanka by two wickets with six balls remaining in a thrilling low scorer One Day International played in Colombo yesterday.
Chevrons skipper, Craig Ervine's 82 and seamer and Richard Ngarava's five wicket haul were in vain as Sri Lanka cruised to a hard fought victory to take a 1-0 lead in the series with one more match to go.
The first ODI was washed out on Saturday.
Zimbabwe were dismissed for 208 all out inside 44.4 overs and after finding themselves in a commanding 180/4 in the 30 overs region, shot themselves in the foot after failing to go past the 250 run mark.
Sri Lanka wobbled to 211/8 to lead the series 1-0. The first match was washed out reducing the series to only two matches now.
Ervine played a blinder of innings, top scoring with 82 runs from 109 deliveries. His knock comprised nine boundaries and a six after he won the toss and chose to bat.
Ervine was the visitors' fifth casualty exiting the crease in the 37th over after he was caught off a stunner by Sadeera Samarawickrama, off the bowling of Dushmantha Chameera who finished with two wickets for 44 runs from eight overs.
Middle order batter, Ryan Burl scored 31 from 37 balls departing shortly after his captain. Burl was bowled out by Chameera.
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Opener, Joylord Gumbie gave the locals a near solid start after losing his partner, Tinashe Kamunhukamwe without troubling the scorers. Gumbie weighed in with 30 runs off 37 balls, before being bowled out by four-wicket hero, Maheesh Theekshana in the 12th over.
Theekshana also grabbed the wicket of Milton Shumba (26), whom he had caught by Arachchinge after 24.2 overs.
At the turn of the innings, Ngarava ran riot rattling through the Sri Lankan top order early in their chase.
The left arm pacer had opener Avishka Fernando caught behind by wicketkeeper Gumbie for four runs in the first over. He then had Samarawickrama (4) and Kusal Mendis (17) the Sri Lanka captain caught by Ervine and Burl respectively in the third and 14th over.
Ngarava also took the wickets of Charith Asalanka (0) and Theekshana (18) while Sikandar Raza grabbed two wickets with Blessing Muzarabani taking one.
Seamer Faraz Akram conceded 13 runs in the penultimate over with Sri Lanka needing 11 runs to win from 12 balls.
