Ervine, Jongwe and Madande seal a thriller against Sri Lanka

Spectacular striking in the final over from Luke Jongwe then Clive Madande saw Zimbabwe tear to a rousing win, in the third tense finish of this tour. Madande hit the winning blow with one ball to spare, but it had been Craig Ervine who had set up the chase of 174 with his 70 off 54.

Ervine had blunted the bowling of Wanindu Hasaranga in particular, who went at 10.25 across his four overs. Still, Zimbabwe needed 20 off the final over, bowled by Angelo Mathews.  Though Zimbabwe’s power-hitting was immense, Sri Lanka also made huge errors to concede victory from a strong position.

The most Zimbabwe had scored from an over before the last one was 13. But captain Hasaranga had used up all his frontliners by the 19th over, in an attempt to close out the match, and he was stuck with having to bowl one of his gentle seamers – Mathews or Dasun Shanaka – in the 20th. And to make things worse for the hosts, they could have just four fielders outside the 30-yard-circle as they were penalised for a slow over rate.

Jongwe was eight off seven balls at this stage. But faced with modest bowling, he began to find the boundary. The first ball was length outside off, which he bludgeoned over long on for six. Crucially, it turned out that Mathews had overstepped when bowling that ball, so Zimbabwe still had six to face.

The next ball – a free-hit – was smashed inside out over cover, as Mathews missed his yorker-length. Then, the killer blow – a thumping six over the bowler’s head, off a slower ball, as Mathews once again let Jongwe get underneath him. Within the space of two legal deliveries, the requirement had come down to three runs, off four balls.

Jongwe would miss the next ball, then send the following one high into the infield off the top edge, only to be dropped by Maheesh Theekshana. Madande applied the finishing blow off the fifth ball, crashing the third six of the over beyond deep midwicket to start lively celebrations, and to send Khettarama into a hush.

Brief scores:
Sri Lanka 173/6 in 20 overs (Charith Asalanka 69, Angelo Mathews 66*; Richard Ngarava 1-30, Blessing Muzarabani 2-36, Luke Jongwe 2-32, Wellington Masakadza 1-25) lost to  Zimbabwe 178/6 in 19.5 overs (Craig Ervine 70, Brian Benett 25, Luke Jongwe 25*; Dilshan Madushanka 1-24, Maheesh Theekshana 2-25, Dushmantha Chameera 2-30, Wanidu Hasaranga 1-31) by four wickets