CARDIFF: Sri Lanka’s Dhananjaya de Silva will replace injured attacking left-hand batsman Kusal Perera at the Champions Trophy tournament in England and Wales, the International Cricket Council announced on Sunday.
The 26-year-old suffered a hamstring injury in Sri Lanka’s seven-wicket victory over defending champions India at the Oval on Thursday.
Perera with an ODI average of 25.69 and three fifties, 25-year-old cricketer is best remembered for his Test century against Australia in the debut Colombo match after which Sri Lanka registered their series win.
Sri Lanka team manager Asanka Gurusinha stated, “We got bad news last night that his hamstring injury is worse than everyone thought so Kusal is out of the tournament.”
In the process, he became the second Sri Lankan player after Chamara Kapugedera to withdraw from the tournament, featuring the world’s top eight one-day international teams.
De Silva, a 25-year-old right-handed top-order batsman and an off-spinner, has represented Sri Lanka in 16 ODIs in which he has scored 334 runs and taken four wickets.
His last ODI was against South Africa at Centurion earlier this year and de Silva was added to Sri Lanka’s Champions Trophy squad following the approval of the ICC’s event technical committee.
Sri Lanka will play Group B rivals Pakistan in Cardiff on Monday, with the match now a virtual quarter-final for both teams.-APP
