HAM­BAN­TO­TA, Sri Lan­ka – West In­dies Women tast­ed their first de­feat to Sri Lan­ka Women in sev­en out­ings when they pro­duced an ane­mic bat­ting ef­fort to crash to a six-wick­et de­feat in Sat­ur­day’s open­ing One-Day In­ter­na­tion­al of the three-match se­ries.

Af­ter mus­ter­ing on­ly 195 all out in the 48th over af­ter be­ing sent in at the Mahin­da Ra­japak­sa In­ter­na­tion­al Crick­et Sta­di­um, the Caribbean side lacked the fire­pow­er to stall the hosts’ run chase, and they got over the line at the start of the 35th over.

Harshitha Sama­rawick­ra­ma top-scored with 44 not out from 53 balls, ex­pert­ly con­trol­ling the chase af­ter Sri Lan­ka lost a clus­ter of wick­ets, by adding 73 for the fourth wick­et with Hasi­ni Per­era (43) and a fur­ther 24 in an un­bro­ken fifth wick­et part­ner­ship with Ni­lak­shi­ka Sil­va (eight not out).

Vish­mi Gu­naratne struck 40 from 51 balls and open­ing part­ner and cap­tain Chamari Atha­p­aththu, 38 from 36 balls, the pair lay­ing the foun­da­tion for a suc­cess­ful chase with a stand of 88.

Fast bowler Aaliyah Al­leyne (2-22) and leg-spin­ner Afy Fletch­er (2-31) fin­ished with two wick­ets apiece.

For their part, West In­dies Women were eye­ing a com­pet­i­tive to­tal when they cruised to 75 for one be­fore suf­fer­ing a col­lapse, the se­nior trio of Hay­ley Matthews (38), Stafanie Tay­lor (33) and She­maine Camp­belle (27) all get­ting starts but fail­ing to car­ry on.

“[It was] not our best game but at the same time I think they’re still pos­i­tives we can take from it,” said cap­tain Matthews.

“I think the fact some of our top or­der were able to get starts shows a de­cent sign, and I think we were def­i­nite­ly set to put on a re­al­ly big score ear­ly on and un­for­tu­nate­ly, lost wick­ets in clumps which I think ham­pered us.”

Rasha­da Williams (6) was an ear­ly ca­su­al­ty in the third over with sev­en runs on the board but Matthews and Camp­belle came to­geth­er to post 68 for the sec­ond wick­et and re­vive their side’s for­tunes.

The styl­ish 26-year-old Matthews struck half-dozen fours in a 53-ball knock while Camp­belle, 31, count­ed four fours in 51 balls at the crease.

When both per­ished in the space of four balls in the 19th over from left-arm spin­ner Sugandi­ka Ku­mari (3-30), sev­er­al small part­ner­ships got West In­dies Women up to their even­tu­al to­tal.

Tay­lor, who faced 56 balls and count­ed three fours, added 33 for the fourth wick­et with Chedean Na­tion (6) and a fur­ther 22 for the sixth wick­et with Aaliyah Al­leyne (14), be­fore Kar­ish­ma Ramharack (14) and Shamil­ia Con­nell (9) put on 25 for the fi­nal wick­et.

The home side dom­i­nat­ed the chase from the out­set be­fore the right-hand­ed Gu­naratne, who struck five fours, fell to the sec­ond ball of Al­leyne’s first spell when she top-edged a pull and was tak­en by the bowler run­ning around to short mid-on.

Al­leyne then bowled Atha­p­aththu in the 14th and when Fletch­er had Kav­isha Dil­hari stumped with­out scor­ing in the 17th over, Sri Lan­ka Women had lost three wick­ets for 13 runs in the space of 20 balls to be 101 for three.

How­ev­er, Per­era ar­rived to lash sev­en fours in a 59-ball knock while Sama­rawick­ra­ma count­ed five fours, to end West In­dies Women’s hopes of a win.

CMC

Scores:

SRI LAN­KA WOMEN 195 off 47.1 overs (Hay­ley Matthews 38, Stafanie Tay­lor 33, She­maine Camp­belle 27; Sugandi­ka Ku­mari 3-30, Kav­isha Dil­hari 3-41)

WEST IN­DIES WOMEN 198 for four off 34.1 overs (Harshitha Sama­rawick­ra­ma 44, Hasi­ni Per­era 43, Vish­mi Gu­naratne 40, Chamari Atha­p­aththu 38; Aaliyah Al­leyne 2-22, Afy Fletch­er 2-31)

Sri Lan­ka Women won by six wick­ets.