Mahela Jayawardene
Mahela Jayawardene
Denagamage Praboth Mahela de Silva Jayawardene, known as Mahela Jayawardene, is a former Sri Lankan cricketer and captain of the Sri Lankan cricket team. He is widely regarded as one of the greats of modern cricket due to his masterful technician oozing class of batting, regarded amongst the best batsman against spin, along with his long time team mate and friend, Kumar Sangakkara and a legend in the history of the game. Jayawardene's highest test score, 374 against South Africa...
ProfessionCricket Player
Date of Birth27 May 1977
CityColombo, Sri Lanka
Marvin and I have been a partnership for quite some time now, so our thinking is in the same direction. It is a temporary thing for me to take the team.
The game has evolved over the years, and I don't think we have as a country. In other countries they have, and they adjust much quicker than our boys.
There is so much uncertainty in cricket. One day you can get a hundred, the next day you can be dismissed for a zero. It makes you become practical about things. Teaches you to accept both success and failure. I think I have learnt a lot about life from cricket.
I thought our team showed a lot of character in coming back so strongly after the setback in the second match. We had decided to keep up the run-rate and bat them out of the match.
We lost wickets in the middle of our innings and lost the momentum from then on. After starting well, we needed to score at least 250 on this pitch.
We want to win everything we play. So we are here for win with a high confidence.
We came here without some main players, but at the end, we finished the series easily. The young players showed a lot of character.
We shouldn't take anything away from him, he batted really well - to bat for eight hours and nearly 400 balls is a magnificent effort.
We know it is a period that we have to rebuild.
We are confident to win all matches here but we will not take Bangladesh lightly.
He is a player that is maturing fast and the challenge for him now is to work hard on his bowling and batting.
He has taken 580-odd wickets in Test cricket. So every team will want to have him in the side. His presence here for the Test is of course a big encouragement for us.
He moves the ball, is difficult for batsman to read and he is not slow. He is the sort of bowler that Pakistan has not had for some time and we know need to look after him.
There is a good probability him making into the XI. He batted really well, he has done his fitness test and the fielding schedules as well.