Sri Lanka make light work of West Indies

Sri Lanka beat West Indies by 57 runs at the Oval to seal their place in the ICC World Twenty20 Final.

Outstanding individual displays from Tillakaratne Dilshan (96 not out) with the bat and Angelo Mathews (3-16) with the ball ensured a safe passage through to Lord's against Pakistan on Sunday.

Sri Lanka's innings of 158-5 was held together by Dilshan as only he and West Indies skipper Chris Gayle (63 not out) got to grips with a slow wicket.

Mathews gave Sri Lanka a great start in the response when he struck with the second, fourth and sixth deliveries of the opening over to leave West Indies in disarray on 1-3. First, Xavier Marshall played on to his first ball as he attempted to steer to third man. Lendl Simmons fared little better as he moved across his stumps to his second ball and was bowled round his legs. Finally, Dwayne Bravo attempted to leave his second ball and became the second batsman in the over to play onto his stumps.

Gayle narrowly failed to become the third batsman to play on when he played a pull shot onto his leg and the ball dropped agonisingly wide of off-stump in Isuru Udana's first over.

Gayle put a slight gloss on the batting side's total with three boundaries in Lasith Malinga's first over and then ended the Powerplay by depositing Udana over wide long-on for the first six of the innings.

Nevertheless, West Indies ended the Powerplay on a parlous 29-3, requiring another 130 for an unlikely victory.

Ajantha Mendis (2-9), one of the leading wicket-takers in the tournament going into the match, with 10, was brought on at the Pavilion End in the seventh over for what had been heralded as the crucial phase of the innings - that the unexpected early burst from Mathews.

Mendis made the next strike, in his second over, when Shivnarine Chanderpaul (7) missed a sweep and was adjudged lbw by umpire Rudi Koertzen.

West Indies had only reached 54-4 by the midway point, needing another 105 from the last 10 overs.

Ramnaresh Sarwan (on 2) was dropped from a skier to long-on by Mendis, off Malinga, but it appeared unlikely the slip would matter for the fielding side.

In fact, Sarwan fell three runs later when he holed out in the same area - this time with Mathews in position - off the bowling of Muttiah Muralidaran.

Gayle was the only batsman to get to grips with the Sri Lankan bowlers, moving to his half-century (out of a total of 69-5) off 39 balls.

Kieron Pollard (3) was the next man to go when he waltzed down the crease and was stumped off a Muralidaran wide.

Muralidaran (3-29) picked up another wicket as batsmen came and went in the dying embers of a match that had effectively been extinguished by Mathews in his first over.

Gayle's lone hand was the only bright spot for West Indies as his 50-ball innings helped his team to three figures - closing on 101 all out from 17.4 overs.

Dilshan was the heartbeat of the Sri Lanka innings as he maintained his outstanding form in the tournament with 96 not out from 57 balls.

West Indies' opening attack of Darren Sammy and Jerome Taylor gave their side an encouraging start when they conceded just six between them from the first two overs.

Sanath Jayasuriya partially broke the stranglehold when he charged Sammy and on-drove for the first boundary of the innings - in the third over.

Dilshan awoke Sri Lanka from their slumber in the fourth over when he helped a Taylor slow bouncer to fine leg and then produced a trademark scoop for six to long-leg next ball.

The leading run-scorer in the tournament (317 by the end of the innings) then proceeded to collect three more boundaries in Bravo's over - two square cuts and one off-drive - in the most expensive over to date (13).

Spin was introduced at the Vauxhall End in the form of Suleiman Benn, who was immediately pulled to the boundary by Jayasuriya.

Gayle then entered the fray at the Pavilion End and tied the batsmen down to three (plus a leg-bye) from his first over.

Sri Lanka's 50 came up off the penultimate ball of the eighth over as the spinners continued to restrict the openers.

Dilshan was finding life much easier than his partner (who had scored from just 10 of his 29 balls faced at that time) and proceeded to stamp his mark on the innings still further with a glided four and a pulled six to midwicket off the first two balls of Gayle's next over.

Sri Lanka reached the halfway stage on 72-0 and seemed well-poised to post a sizeable total, only for three wickets to fall in the next two overs.

Jayasuriya's scratchy innings (24 off 37 balls) ended when he attempted to flip Bravo to the leg-side boundary but could only pick out Taylor at leg-gully.

Bravo then removed Kumar Sangakkara for a second-ball duck when the left-hander stretched his bat out to cut a wide delivery to backward point, where Pollard took a fine leaping catch.

Mahela Jayawardena (2) then flicked Pollard to Chanderpaul at short fine-leg as Sri Lanka lost their third wicket for four runs.

Dilshan remained calm as everybody was losing their heads around him and duly reached his half-century off 30 balls.

The experienced right-hander pulled the first boundary for three overs at the start of the 14th and then flicked another four to leg as his presence appeared to be the difference between West Indies and restricting the batting side to a below-par total.

Sri Lanka reached the last five overs on 98-3 and it was, predictably, Dilshan who kick-started the final batting push with nine of the 10 runs that came off Taylor's next over.

Dilshan then diverted successive deliveries from Sammy behind square to the boundary, savaged the next - a full toss - to midwicket for another four and then Chamara Silva pulled the last ball to backward square leg as 18 came off the 17th over.

Silva went in the next when he gloved a reverse-sweep off Benn to wicketkeeper Ramdin (his partnership of 50 with Dilshan, of which he'd contributed 11, came from just 35 balls).

Jehan Mubarak (7) top-edged a pull off Taylor to Sammy, who took a fine low catch diving forward at midwicket.

After a pull to the long-leg boundary, Dilshan went into the final over needing nine runs to become the second batsman to record a Twenty20 International century.

Appropriately it was Gayle, the only man to have reached three figures in the 20-over format, who came on to bowl those six balls.

It was Dilshan's partner, Mathews, who dominated the strike, to good effect, as he slammed a six and a four back past the bowler.

Dilshan needed six from the last ball to reach his ton but he could only manage two to midwicket.

Sri Lanka thus go into the Final against Pakistan with six consecutive wins behind them, hoping Pakistan don't wreck an unbeaten record for the second time in the competition, after their defeat of South Africa in the first semi-final.