Allrounder slams unbeaten 23-ball 77 to help Northern Warriors ace a tall chase of 146 in the Abu Dhabi T10

Aadam Patel27-Nov-20210:42

Moeen Ali: In T10, the big and strong guys are the successful ones

When the decision came towards the back end of the English summer, it was no real surprise to anyone that Moeen Ali, 34, was calling time on his Test career.Even the prospect of adding an away Ashes victory this winter to his illustrious list of achievements wasn’t enough to change his mind. He insisted that the decision was based on how he had felt during the series against India. A feeling of being unable to “get in the zone.””I just didn’t feel like I was fully wholeheartedly into it,” Moeen had said.Related

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As he belted his way to 77 not out off just 23 deliveries on Saturday night, whilst the Arabian sun set over the Emirate of Abu Dhabi, there was almost a sense of a man just wanting to enjoy whatever remains of his cricketing career. In his typical relaxed nature, Moeen was just getting about doing what he loved best.He played a beautiful knock under a quite beautiful setting, as he and Kennar Lewis, with a devastating 65 off 32 of his own, made light work of a target of 146. The Northern Warriors reached their target against Team Abu Dhabi without losing a wicket and with five balls to spare.It was a stunning partnership that broke all sorts of records: the fastest 50 (16 balls) and the highest individual score (77*) of this edition of the Abu Dhabi T10, both to Moeen’s name; the highest partnership (146) in Abu Dhabi T10 history and the most sixes by a team (15) in a T10 innings.Without the thought of the longer format weighing him down, Moeen seems to be thriving in the UAE. From playing an integral role in Chennai Super Kings’ IPL winning campaign under MS Dhoni, to playing every game for England at the T20 World Cup under Eoin Morgan, here is a man who is perhaps finally feeling a semblance of the stability that he has always desired.”There’s definitely a freedom in my game [after retiring from Test cricket],” Moeen said after taking the Warriors to the highest chase in T10 history. “I know exactly what I need to work on. Previously, I was switching from format to format which was great, but over time it just weighs you down, and I think that was the thing with me.”Mooen’s blitz proved why he was picked in the first round of the Abu Dhabi T10 draft.Moeen Ali – “Previously, I was switching from format to format which was great, but over time it just weighs you down”•Associated PressA couple of nights ago, he opened up to ESPNcricinfo about the challenges he had been facing within the T10 format.”I find this really difficult,” he admitted. “As you can see. A lot of the guys are big and strong and they can hit the ball miles from ball one. I find that a bit of a struggle. In T10, the guys who are successful are the guys that are big and strong.”All it took to change his mind was a match-winning knock against the league leaders and the strongest side of the tournament. Needing 62 off four overs, the game was still in the balance, but Moeen sent six of the next seven deliveries he faced to the boundary, before Lewis smashed two more sixes off Liam Livingstone’s penultimate over to all but seal the victory.”If you asked me a few days ago, I’d have said that T10 is probably not for me as I’m not one of the big guys, but I guess it shows that you don’t have to be big and strong. You just need a bit of power and some timing and today showed me how quickly you can actually score in this format. It was great for my confidence.”Moeen has always been somewhat of a confidence player – someone who has flowed much better with the outright backing of the decision-makers and without the pressure of having a point to prove.At the IPL, he joked that Super Kings could have dropped him after a few games. Yet, a focus on loyalty across the franchise and the support of Dhoni allowed him the chance to flourish. “They’re so calm and clear in what they do. You get the backing here and you want to give it back as much as you can,” Moeen had said after the IPL final.

“You don’t have to be big and strong. You just need a bit of power and some timing and today showed me how quickly you can actually score in this format.”Moeen on his T10 exploits

Moeen enjoyed the rub of the green early his innings with some top edges to the boundary, but it was enough to encourage him to express himself.”Sometimes, those top edges are good because it gets you going and you don’t worry about the strike rate. Sometimes, when you’re going at a run a ball or even when you’re like five off three, you still feel a bit under pressure. I didn’t have that in the back of my mind after those top edges today, so I knew I could just play.”As Moeen shuts the door firmly on the longest format of the game – an experience he admitted he will miss – one wonders what might have become of Moeen’s journey had he not lost his central contract in 2019? Before the Ashes that summer, he had been the leading wicket-taker in the world over the previous 12 months.For now, here is a man content with where he’s at.”I’m really happy I can just focus on white-ball cricket now,” Moeen said.

Jason Roy and Harry Brook’s scintillating hundreds find a place among the top five most impactful performances in the tournament

ESPNcricinfo stats team28-Feb-2022Shadab Khan was the MVP of PSL 2022, according to ESPNcricinfo’s Smart Stats. Shadab had a stellar PSL taking 19 wickets and scoring 268 runs at a strike rate of 162.42. No one in the PSL previously has scored 250 runs and taken more than 15 wickets in a season. If you also consider a strike rate of at least 160, only five players in the leagues across the world have achieved this feat. And he did all this while also leading Islamabad United.Shadab’s best performance, though, came in a losing cause when he picked up 4 for 20 and scored 52 off 32 balls against the eventual champions, Lahore Qalandars.His best batting performance in the tournament was when he scored 91 off 42 balls against Multan Sultans. Chasing a mammoth 218, he walked in during the powerplay when the score was 57 for 2. While wickets fell regularly at the other end, Shadab single-handedly kept United in the chase. He smashed nine sixes and was the ninth batter dismissed in the 19th over. Here, too, United lost the game.Smart Stats, which looks at every performance through the prism of match context and consider the pressure on the batter/bowler before every delivery, tell us that Shadab’s 268 runs were worth 309, while his 19 wickets were worth 17.ESPNcricinfo LtdShadab’s Match Impact of 80 is way ahead of the second-placed Jason Roy, who had a Match Impact score of 65. Roy was the leading run scorer for Quetta Gladiators with 303 runs, at an average of 50 and a strike rate of 170, despite playing only six matches.In a tournament where the conditions were not favourable for the bowlers, Liam Dawson finished the tournament with an economy rate of 6.76 from seven games and had the third-best Match Impact. After that, there’s little to separate Rashid Khan, Fakhar Zaman and Mohammad Haris.Most impactful bowlers
The list of bowlers with the highest Smart Wickets is slightly different from the list of top wicket-takers as Smart Wickets take into account the quality of batter dismissed, their score at the time of dismissal and the match situation at that point. Taking all those factors into account, Qalandars’ captain Shaheen Shah Afridi topped the Smart Wickets tally. His 20 wickets were worth 25 since 12 of the 20 wickets he took were of the top three batters, which opened up many games for his team. Interestingly, he dismissed 19 different batters in the tournament for his 20 wickets.While the second-highest wicket-taker of the tournament was Shadab with 19 scalps, it’s Salman Irshad who is second on the Smart Wickets list. His 15 wickets were valued at 18.5; 9 of his 15 wickets were of the top three batters. Irshad dismissed Babar Azam, Mohammad Rizwan, Alex Hales, Shadab and Asif Ali (twice) in the tournament. His wickets also came when the match was well poised.ESPNcricinfo LtdBoth Zaman Khan and Shahnawaz Dahani’s Smart Wickets tally was slightly lower than their actual tally since some of their wickets were of lower-order batters or when the wickets did not impact the result.Best performances in a match
Shadab’s earlier-mentioned all-round show against Qalandars was the most impactful performance of the whole tournament, while his batting heroics against Sultans find a place at fifth spot.Roy’s 116 off 57 balls against Qalandars had the second-best match impact of the tournament. Roy smashed 11 fours and eight sixes to help Gladiators chase down 205 in 19.3 overs.Mohammad Hafeez’s all-round show in the final was the fourth-best performance of PSL 2022. Coming into bat at 25 for 3, Hafeez scored 69 off 46 balls to set the platform for the finishers. With ball, he took the key wicket of Mohammad Rizwan that set up the game for Qalandars.ESPNcricinfo LtdHarry Brook’s scintillating hundred round up the top five. Coming in at 12 for 3, Brook scored 102 from just 49 deliveries helping his team to a winning total of 197 against United.

Nearly 91% of all his deliveries this season have been above 140kmph… and that’s only half the story

Jarrod Kimber24-Apr-20224:15

Sanjay Manjrekar: Umran Malik has been ‘allowed to blossom’ at SRH

“This is the moment so many look forward to in a Sunrisers [Hyderabad] encounter,” Simon Doull says on commentary. “Umran Malik. Genuine pace, Umran Malik.”Malik is smiling. So is Nicholas Pooran, who has just taken the ball well above his head. Kevin Pietersen seems to have said yippee on air..”There’s pace, there’s bounce, yes there is,” Pietersen says. “Bang.”Matthew Hayden adds, “146 would you please?””Just a warm-up” Doull says, almost doubting what he has just seen.Malik’s first bouncer has taken this game to another level.Even though Marco Jansen has taken three wickets in the second over and already opened up the match. Even though Jansen might well be the world’s best bowler in a few years. He has decent pace, incredible height, seam, swing, is accurate, and uses a left arm. Two of those can get you a good career; three, and you’re a long-term player. I don’t know what having all six can do, because the only player even close was Bruce Reid, and we barely ever saw him fit.Compared to him, Malik is fairly one-dimensional, but that singular skill is about the sexiest thing in our sport: raw pace.Lots of bowlers are quick; we’ve never had this many bowlers who can deliver at over 90 miles – or 145 kilometres – per hour. But Malik is faster than that. He’s in the Lockie Ferguson category. And there aren’t that many others really with them.Nearly 91% of all Umran Malik deliveries this season have been above 140kmph•BCCIIt means that every ball is an event. So after that opening bouncer, the next one is a length ball, outside off stump, too wide and not exciting, but that doesn’t douse down the excitement at all.A quick technical explanation follows, showing how well aligned Malik is, and the braced front leg. Hayden compares him to Waqar Younis, Doull to Haris Rauf. Pace is pace, .The cameras quickly find Dale Steyn – the bowling coach for Sunrisers – watching on in the dugout. Malik has not yet finished his over, and already he’s completely changed the entire conversation. In many ways, the game is already over, yet it feels more alive than ever through him.Malik’s story is well known. He didn’t touch a cricket ball until he was 17. He was bowling on a cement wicket in the nets in Jammu and Kashmir when India’s U-19 selectors saw him. Those balls led to him becoming the fourth player from Jammu and Kashmir to play in the IPL.This is not an Indian cricket hotbed. Parvez Rasool is the first – and only – Indian international from J&K, having played two white-ball matches. In the IPL there’s also been Mithun Manhas (born in the province but who built his career in Delhi before returning), Rasikh Salam, Abdul Samad and Manzoor Dar (was picked up by a franchise but never played a game).4:25

What’s the ideal way to handle Umran Malik?

J&K has had serious pace before too, in the shape of Abid Nabi in the mid-2000s. Though he took over a hundred Ranji Trophy wickets and had some success in the Indian Cricket League he never quite materialised fully.This is different. This is real pace. If Nabi was the dream, Malik is the reality.His second over starts with Harsha Bhogle mentioning that the slip is standing right on the edge of the 30-yard circle. The second ball is a wicket, short and at the body. Shahbaz Ahmed is beaten for pace. By the time he catches up to it, he can only feather it down the legside for Pooran to complete a great diving catch.The following ball Wanindu Hasaranga is beaten, a fast delivery angled in at him, but moving away. This isn’t an excellent T20 ball, it would be brilliant in any format. A few balls later he is playing across the ball trying to hit it to leg, and it ends up outside off.It looks uncomfortable and no fun for anyone. There is a story from the beginning of Malik’s career when he was at Sunrisers. Jonny Bairstow was facing him in the nets and had to ask for him to bowl slower. And when he arrived in the IPL it took only a few balls into his career when people started noticing him. This was clearly next level pace.His third over begins with a chyron on the screen that asks a simple question: “Is Umran Malik the fastest bowler India has ever produced?”Umran Malik was the talk of the town during the Sunrisers vs RCB game•BCCISunil Gavaskar suggests you can only know that about the modern era. But Indian bowlers have not been fast historically, even if in recent times that has changed, Jasprit Bumrah, Varun Aaron, Ishant Sharma, Umesh Yadav have all been very fast. Or at least capable of rapid deliveries at times.Malik is consistently fast, like Mark Wood. His slowest on-pace balls are not slow. And he doesn’t bother with slower balls much at all. The consistent high pace is something else, because there is no let up. If you don’t like it this fast, you have a problem. This isn’t a one-off effort ball; it’s just his stock delivery.His speeds in this match come up on the screen. The slowest is 138.6kmph, which is still a quick delivery. But the average is 145kmph. To stay at 90 miles per hour consistently is hard for even the fastest bowlers (although in this case, the average is helped by his lack of a slower ball).More numbers of his speeds in his IPL career so far come up

• <120kmph: 1.4%
• 120-129kmph 1.4%
• 130-139kmph 6.4%
• >140kmph 90.8%

In fact, he doesn’t bowl slower balls. Only 2.8% of his deliveries are under 130kmph. Because he is so quick, some of his slower ones are in the low 130s. But he only bowls 6.4% of his deliveries at 130 to 139. At the very most he bowls a slower ball every ten deliveries, and in truth, it’s probably far less than that. Those are not normal rates.There is a DRS for caught behind that is overturned and Bhogle excitedly exclaims “Two slips in the 12th over, wow” as Malik finishes his third.The fourth over has some pace in it. The first five balls are 151kmph, 148kmph, 151kmph, 141kmph and 147kmph. That is probably why 77% of the fan poll say Malik is India’s fastest bowler ever.3:55

The Umran Malik conundrum: Enviable pace vs run-leaking tendency

His pace now has Pietersen asking whether he is so fast his line and length don’t matter, as poor Josh Hazlewood backs away and plays a shot so tentative it apologises for the play-and-miss. The talk is now about Shaun Tait and Mitchell Johnson. Later it will be Shoaib Akhtar, although that is after his spell is finished. That is in Jansen’s over, the man who set up the win. They’re still buzzing about Malik.Jansen took out Faf Du Plessis, Virat Kohli and Anuj Rawat in one over. T Natarajan was pretty good too, knocking out Harshal Patel and Hasraranga’s stumps and taking Glenn Maxwell. Even J Sucith took two wickets. But the man with one wicket gets all the attention.In the mid-match interview, Steyn is asked about Malik before Jansen. In the innings break, Pietersen is still talking about Malik unprompted, even as they show the other bowlers taking wickets. RCB are dismissed for 68, and the bowler with one victim is the story almost all the way through. You can put some of this down to the fact he is a young Indian quick. But a lot of it is just because he is young and that quick.The real proof was in the way the commentators reacted to the two bouncers in that first over. The first one I described earlier. But the last one was just as important. It flashed by a missed hook shot, and it was his second delivery over the shoulder, meaning it was a no-ball, and RCB would get a free hit.Usually, a mistake like that would get the commentators all upset with the bowler and the lack of discipline. Instead Hayden bellows: “Bring it on, bring it on,” while Pietersen is just laughing. Shabaz slaps the free hit over cover for a boundary, meaning the extra bouncer cost Sunrisers 7.3% of RCB’s total.No one cares. Because Umran Malik is fast.

For a country infamous for its opening woes, Shafique doesn’t just feel like the right answer, but an entire exam being aced

Osman Samiuddin20-Jul-2022It’s fine. You have permission to get all kinds of giddy about Abdullah Shafique. Permission to throw all kinds of stats and facts and nonsense trivia and taunts and boasts out there, to prove that your opener is bigger than their opener.Like this first, which is a good, chunky one: Shafique is now only the second opener after Gordon Greenidge to remain unbeaten in a successful chase of a 300-plus target. Yes, Gordon Greenidge. Here is one that is totally arbitrary but also kind of history-bending: Shafique now sits behind only Sunil Gavaskar, Don Bradman and George Headley in the list of most runs made after six (arbitrary alert) Tests. Yes, Little Master, The Greatest and Atlas (because he carried his team).There’s one for purists: the 524 minutes Shafique batted in this chase represent the longest anyone has batted in a successful fourth-innings chase. Yes, half the time Hanif batted in Bridgetown, but for the win. Then this one for the trolls among you: in his six-Test career so far, Shafique already has more runs in the fourth innings than Salman Butt, Ramiz Raja and Ahmed Shehzad managed in their entire careers.Related

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Shafique's epic 160* leads Pakistan to fourth-innings glory

And this one, which is my favourite already: Shafique has faced as many fourth-innings deliveries in six Tests (922) as it took Virender Sehwag 87 Tests to face. Or, as it took Gavaskar 50 Tests to face. It is a totally meaningless stat because how many balls an opener gets to face in the fourth innings is a consequence of events mostly outside of the control of that opener. But it has massive Big Data Energy.Which, right now, is almost the point of Shafique. He has accomplished feats of such scale, feats that have otherwise taken decades to occur in Tests, feats that have taken batters entire careers to achieve, in such a short span of time that the impulse is to play it down, to dismiss it as the kind of statistical freakery multiple players exhibited early in their careers. It happens.But a competing impulse to pay it every bit – and then some – of attention is greatest in the aftermath of this 160*. Joe Root scored his first hundred in the fourth innings – let alone in a successful chase – in June this year, nearly a decade and 115 Tests into his career. Younis Khan had to jump through the nine circles of hell to become the fourth-innings giant he eventually became, also nearly a decade into his career. South Africa were lucky to amble across some granite out of which they carved Graeme Smith and here’s Abdullah Shafique, nine first-class games old, earnestly strumming covers on his acoustic guitar and saving and winning Tests on the final day of Tests like he’s Younis Khan by day and Atif Aslam by night. In some countries, he may have done enough to have already secured a knighthood.Shafique displayed a 90% control factor, over nearly nine hours across the last two days on a Galle surface difficult for fourth-innings batting•AFP/Getty ImagesIt’s also impossible to not get sucked into some hyperbole because Pakistani openers (*checks notes*).. oh that’s right, PAKISTANI OPENERS. In the last innings, on the last day, of Tests they are in their truest element. Having scored runs in all situations, this is generally their time to fail, the first to fall in what is usually a prelude to disaster or, on the good days, the early jitters that a middle order eases away.Pakistan haven’t had a genuine, living, breathing opener, one they can really believe in and hold on to, one more durable than a cryptocurrency, for so long it’s possible they’ve forgotten what one looks like. Saeed Anwar’s been gone over 20 years which means there’s young adults in Pakistan who don’t know that in cricket, a good batting order begins with a good opener.They’ve had some who have tried hard, bless them. But in those two decades, Pakistan’s five most prolific openers are Mohammad Hafeez, Taufeeq Umar, Imran Farhat, Salman Butt and Azhar Ali, who’s not really even an opener.

“Pakistan haven’t had a genuine, living, breathing opener, one they can really believe in and hold on to, one more durable than a cryptocurrency, for so long it’s possible they’ve forgotten what one looks like”

There are some decent numbers between them. There are some good innings too. Some decent careers. But if a collective epitaph were to record their contributions, it might say they were openings into an innings for the opposition, more than openers of an innings. It might be a little cruel sure, but it wouldn’t be entirely inaccurate.In those two decades, there’s not a single Pakistan opening pair that has scored 1000 runs together while averaging at least 40 as a partnership. Nine Full Members feature in that, most of them multiple times, which tells you that the filter benchmarks are not elite. Not a single Pakistan pair. So desperate were Pakistan for an opener that all through last year – true story – they played a specialist slip catcher in that position.Against this backdrop, what does it matter that Shafique’s match-saving 96 against Australia was made on a flat pitch, sorry, great batting track? Or that this 160* was against an inexperienced Sri Lanka attack banking on the guy in his second Test? Fourth-innings runs are like Tough Mudder runs – considerable distances and with obstacles which, in the case of Australia, meant Pat Cummins, Mitchell Starc and Nathan Lyon.ESPNcricinfo LtdAnd in Galle, it meant Galle, which is to spin what Sabina Park and Perth used to be to fast bowling. Before this chase, no ground in the world (where at least 20 Tests have been played) was more difficult for fourth-innings batting than Galle.This surface maybe didn’t bite quite as sharply as it can do there and maybe it was slower, but it never stopped doing things. It was never not difficult. But to be able to concentrate for as long as Shafique did, to hold his nerve after being beaten by rippers, blank it out and move on, took plenty of doing. It’s not like he was hurtling into this target, so he had to do that very often, relying entirely on his defensive technique as the means of attack. There was never any real momentum to ride along on, except for a period in the partnership with Mohammad Rizwan. For the last 67 overs of his innings, Shafique hit just two boundaries and one of them was the final hit.A 90% control factor, over nearly nine hours across the last two days on a Galle surface, with just the one rush of blood – possibly because he knew rain was coming – can be sliced in any number of ways, none of which can play it down.Pakistan have been here before with openers, admittedly to far lesser degree of giddiness. Among all the ordinary data for modern Pakistani openers is also the trend which shows that a good number begun brightly. Five Tests in Abid Ali (averaging 69.5), Sami Aslam (43.5), Hafeez (45.88), Imran Farhat (37.11) all felt like the answer. Six Tests in, Shafique feels not like one right answer but an entire exam being aced.And that is why Pakistan is here and why post-Galle – apologies for the comedown – is where it gets real for Shafique. The problem isn’t that Pakistan’s openers don’t start well. It’s that they end badly.

Boundaries and dropped catches galore

Sampath Bandarupalli14-Jun-2022The Bairstow-Stokes blitz
77 Balls needed for Jonny Bairstow’s century, the second-fastest fourth-innings hundred in Test cricket. The fastest came off 76 balls by Gilbert Jessop against Australia in 1902 at The Oval. Bairstow’s hundred is also the second quickest in terms of balls for England in Tests, behind Jessop’s 76-ball effort.ESPNcricinfo Ltd8.87 Run rate during the 179-run partnership between Jonny Bairstow and Ben Stokes, the third-fastest century stand in Tests in terms of run rate (where balls data is available). It is also the quickest partnership by run rate in Test cricket, that lasted 20-plus overs.10.00 England’s run-rate in the final session of the match. They needed 160 runs in 38 overs but took only 16 to score those. Their scoring rate of 10 is the highest for a team in a single session of a Test match since 2016 (where a team batted 15 or more overs).
The previous highest run rate was 8.29 by New Zealand during the post-lunch session on the first day of the Christchurch Test against Australia in 2016. New Zealand scored 199 runs in only 24 overs, while losing three wickets.England’s record chase
5.98 England’s run rate during the 299-run chase, the fourth-highest for any team in a Test innings where they scored 250-plus runs. The highest is 6.80 by South Africa when they scored 340 for three in 50 overs against Zimbabwe in the 2005 Cape Town Test.0 Number of 200-plus targets successfully chased in Test cricket, faster than England’s run rate of 5.98 in Nottingham. The previous fastest 200-plus chase in Tests was by England, who chased 204-run target against South Africa in 1948, scoring at 5.77 runs an over.ESPNcricinfo Ltd299 The target chased by England in this match is the highest successful Test chase at Trent Bridge. England broke their own record, having chased 284 in 2004 against New Zealand. The 299-run chase is also the third-highest by any team against New Zealand in Tests and the fifth-highest for England.1 Previous instance of a team chasing down a 250-plus target twice in a Test series before England in the ongoing series. The other instance was recorded by England when they chased 282 and 284 respectively at Lord’s and Nottingham against New Zealand in 2004.Boundaries galore and high-scoring rate
1 The Nottingham Test between England and New Zealand became the first-ever Test match with 1000-plus boundary runs. The previous most boundary runs in a Test was 976 runs during the Sydney Test in 2004 between Australia and India.ESPNcricinfo Ltd249 Number of boundaries hit by England and New Zealand – 225 fours and 24 sixes. These are the most boundary hits in a Test match, surpassing the 242 during the Australia-India Test match in 2004 in Sydney. Although, the 225 fours at Trent Bridge are the second-most in a match, behind only the 238 fours in the 2004 Sydney Test.4.10 Scoring rate in this match is the highest for a Test match (Where 2100-plus balls were bowled). The previous highest run rate in a Test was 4.08 during the Test between England and India in 1990 at Lord’s.ESPNcricinfo Ltd1675 Runs scored by both teams in this match, the eighth-highest aggregate in Tests and the highest in the last 15 years. It is also the second-highest match aggregate for a Test match in England, behind the 1723 runs in the 1948 Leeds Test between England and Australia.837 runs in vain
837 New Zealand’s match aggregate at Trent Bridge is the second-most runs scored by a team in a Test defeat. The highest aggregate to lose a Test is 861 runs by England (496 all-out and 365 for 8) against Australia in the 1948 Leeds Test.ESPNcricinfo Ltd6 Test matches with a result where both teams scored 500-plus runs in their first innings, including the Nottingham Test. In all those six matches, the team conceding the first-innings lead ended up on the winning side.Butter fingers
11 Catches dropped by both the teams in this Test match. In the last four years, only two Test matches had higher number of dropped chances – 12 in the 2021 Harare Test between Zimbabwe and Bangladesh, and 12 dropped catches during the Chattogram Test between Bangladesh and Sri Lanka earlier in May.