da betsul： Indian captain Sourav Ganguly after his side’s humiliating defeat inthe final of the Coca-Cola Cup where his side was beaten convincinglyby Sri Lanka admitted that his side had been outplayed by Sri Lanka inall departments of the game
Rex Clementine06-Aug-2001Indian captain Sourav Ganguly after his side’s humiliating defeat inthe final of the Coca-Cola Cup where his side was beaten convincinglyby Sri Lanka admitted that his side had been outplayed by Sri Lanka inall departments of the game. “We just didn’t play well. We failed inall departments. We gave away too many runs, missed catches and neverlooked in the game when we batted. It was just an off day in everyform of the game,” said a disappointed Ganguly.Sri Lanka’s total was boosted by three half centuries from SanathJayasuriya (99), Mahela Jayawardene and Russel Arnold. The otherbatsmen Avishka Gunawardene and Romesh Kaluwitharana contributed with30’s while only Marvan Atapattu failed.”It was a collective team effort from them. Not only Sanath, evenguys like Mahela and Russell batted well to take the game away fromus” remarked Ganguly on Sri Lanka’s strong batting line up, whichclicked in the all important final.Sri Lanka ended up making the highest score recorded in the tournamentand that took the initiative away from the Indians even before theystarted the run chase, “You never give up. But I thought 290 was a bittoo much. You need something exceptional on occasions like that,”explained Ganguly.The Indian captain who lost the toss in the final felt that theturning point of the game was the dropped catch of Sanath Jayasuriya,”We missed a catch off Sanath with Sri Lanka on 120. I thought thatwas very crucial. That helped them to put up another 40 runs or so.”The Indians now have lost eight consecutive tournament finals. Gangulyhas acted as the captain of the side on four of those occasions,”We’ve been not doing well in the finals. We have lost five finals inhe last eight months or so,” said GangulyWhen asked about the reason behind losing finals the Indian captainreplied, “I don’t know. Probably we are giving away too many runs. Itwas 290 plus in Zimbabwe, it was 290 plus in Sharjah and it was thesame here. When you give that many runs away it becomes a difficulttask” said Ganguly blaming his bowlers and fielders for giving awaytoo many runs in the crucial match.