Kumar Sangakarra, the Man of the Match in Sri Lanka's VB Series victory over South Africa yesterday, hopes to build on the win and dispel doubts about his team's credibility.
Speaking to BBC Sport, Sangakarra was relieved that Sri Lanka could get over South Africa. "It's been a tough couple of months but it's done us a world of good. It shows you need a lot of character to play this game," he said. "You need to go through the tough times and keep yourselves together. Moments like these make it all worthwhile."
Sangakarra top-scored with 88 in a total of 282 for 6 as Sri Lanka bounced back from a woeful performance against Australia on Friday to record a 94-run win over South Africa. "The ball comes on at an even bounce here and there's not much movement so what more can you ask for as a batsman?" Sangakarra said. "It was getting the basics right, doing our homework properly and getting prepared. Let the result take care of itself and just worry about what we can control."
Sri Lanka's win over South Africa was only their third in 13 matches, but Sangakarra believed this run of bad form was no bad matter. "Ever since the 1996 World Cup [which Sri Lanka won] we have had a great record in one-dayers," he said. "We owe a debt of gratitude to those players and it's something we should be proud of. All the players should know their place in history and respect that."
Graeme Smith, South Africa's captain, refused to use his side's mounting injury toll as an excuse for a below-par showing. "The injury situation is definitely becoming a big irritation because it is very difficult to build any sort of momentum or continuity with players in and out of the side," Smith said to The Australian." But we have to deal with what we have got and today we just had bad basics from top to bottom. We let ourselves down in the opening overs with some ordinary bowling, and our fielding and batting wasn't any better. But one bad performance doesn't make a bad team and we can regroup and bounce back from this."