A prediction by the world’s leading scalp hunter Muttiah Muralidaran that Afghanistan will beat Sri Lanka at the on-going cricket World Cup came to pass when the former triumphed by seven wickets on Monday.
Muralidaran the record holder of the highest number of 800 Test wickets did not see a slow bowler living up to his expectations but rather a fast bowler and Afghanistan’s Fazalhaq Farooqi did not disappoint the legendary Sri Lankan spinner.
Fazalhaq Farooqi
“They (Afghanstan) have one of the best bowling attacks, four spinners are unbelievable spinners because they are different. Farooqi and the fast bowlers are also very skilled and they have been picked in IPL teams.
“Batting-wise they have a powerful batting line-up because they just play very attacking cricket. That’s the style that we played in 1996 when we won the World Cup,” Muralidaran said before the start of the match in which Afghanistan bowled out Sri Lanka for 241 and won with seven wickets and 4.4 overs in the bag.
Farooqi did not feature in Afghanistan previous match against Pakistan that they won and was only in as a replacement.
He bagged four scalps for 34 runs that included Dimuth Karunaratne, Charith Asalanka and Angelo Mathews and was adjudged player-of-the match.
