Rain saves the Queen

Story by M. Shamil Amit reporting from Galle, Pic by Ranjith Perera

If one says that rain cooked the Lankan goose he will not be very far away from the truth. Looking out to oust the hapless Englishmen from an almost undeserving second spot in the World Rankings and climb to a more deserving place in The world rankings the wishes of local cricketers were washed away with a wicked second shower in the mid afternoon at the Galle Cricket Stadium, yesterday.

The ground boys ran between the wickets more than the English batsmen.

Now the Lankans can say –“Yet we climbed to number three in rankings and you go down fifth spot where we were”. South Africa now takes second place.

It was the twenty-two-year-old Alistair Cook who stood for the queen’s cause and helped England occupy their place in the middle till the rains came down with a fighting knock of 118. Nevertheless the Barmy-army who follows the English sportsmen was visibly annoyed and disappointed. One banner read “5 days of torture, thanks for nothing”, while another read “England hang your heads in shame”. At least they found a way of venting their frustration. Then what about the frustrated local fan? How can they fight the vagaries of nature? Yet they kept on shouting “Rain, rain go away come again another day”.

The man who was disappointed the most -- Skipper Mahela Jayawardena said that he was satisfied that with a one nil result especially after a disappointing series in Australia. “We looked forward to win the series by two games but unfortunately the weather came as a stumbling block. Though Alastair Cook was batting well we were aiming to get his partners out. We succeeded in getting three successive wickets, and then we got the confidence and had a feeling that we could pull off the game but unfortunately the weather disrupted our plans and shattered our hopes. But overall I am satisfied with the team performance and if we put in more effort we are capable of performing even better. The boys now have earned a good week’s holiday which they earned”.

At one satisfying moment rookie Welagedera cooked Alistair’s goose, but, sure when weather gods saw the frustration in Vaughan’s face it must have decided to come down for the second time. Well you got away this time with a 1-0 after beating us in the one dayers, but we will not be so kind the next time over. It was just “Rain saved the Queen”.