CRICKET: "Pressure?" said the Sri Lankan coach Dav Whatmore yesterday, imparting the sort of spin of which Muttiah Muralitharan would have been proud. "The Australians are the team under pressure, not us."
It did not seem like it yesterday. With a giant trip wire waiting to upend their 15-match winning run, Ricky Ponting's side played the cool dudes.
The morning practice session was to the point but scarcely intense and the big guns, Brett Lee and Glenn McGrath, kept their feet up back at the hotel, their preparations for today's semi-final complete.
When the Sri Lankans dragged their kit over to the St George's Park nets they found the Aussies still there and they stood around glowering. The contrast is evident: Australia are relaxed because they feel they are unstoppable, while Sri Lanka have teetered between incompetence and the sort of performance that saw them beat Australia in the World Cup final in Lahore eight years ago.
Little more than a week ago in Centurion, Australia rattled up 319 for five and then unleashed Brett Lee to such devastating early effect that Sri Lanka lost by 96 runs.
And yet. Perhaps there is something in the big games: that World Cup final, for instance, or the semi-final of last year's ICC Champions trophy, which Sri Lanka won convincingly. Sri Lanka remain the only team to beat Australia in one-day cricket in the best part of a year.
The pitch will play its part although perhaps too much has been made of this. Four matches at St George's Park this tournament certainly have made life difficult for batsmen, with the ball tending to grab fractionally on the surface, making timing difficult.
Today's pitch, for all the talk of a belter, promises to be little different. Slow and medium bowlers will have their say. But two of the fastest bowlers in the world, Shane Bond and Brett Lee, bowled wonderfully here last week, and Andy Bichel, no slouch, devastated England with a seven-wicket haul.
An X-ray yesterday confirmed that Damien Martyn has a fracture to the index finger of his right hand and will miss the game, the likely replacement being Jimmy Maher with a choice then between Andrew Symonds batting and useful bowling and Ian Harvey's clever bowling and ordinary batting.
There is unlikely to be a change in the Sri Lankan team, meaning that Avishka Gunawardene, who batted with purpose at number three in the victory over Zimbabwe on Saturday, will retain his place ahead of Mahela Jayawardene.
The key to the game will be the toss and the first 15 overs of each innings. If Sri Lanka can win the toss and bat first, if Sanath Jayasuriya and Marvan Atapattu can see off Lee and McGrath, then the middle order, led by Aravinda de Silva, might raise a competitive total.
If Chaminda Vaas can get among the Australian top order and pave the way for Muralitharan, Sri Lanka can compete strongly. They have already exceeded expectation. Perhaps they can do so further.
