Mendis hammered 14 fours and 6 sixes in what was the fastest WC ton b a Sri Lankan.
Dasun Shanaka won the toss and chose to bat first on a batting beauty of a pitch at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium, Uppal, Hyderabad. Maheesh Theekshana returned to bolster the Lanka bowling. Pakistan left out out-of-form Fakhar Zaman and brought in Abdullah Shafique.
Kusal Perera failed once again as he was dismissed for a duck by Hassan Ali. But then Pathum Nissanka (51) added 102 runs with Kusal Mendis for the second wicket before falling to Shadab Khan.
But the stand-out player for Sri Lanka proved to be Kusal Mendis. He was coming off a 158 against Afghanistan in the warm-up match and a cracking 76 against South Africa in the chase of 429 runs in Delhi.
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He made his half-century in 40 balls and then switched gears. He went after every Pakistani bowler against him and in a flurry of boundaries and sixes, reached his century in 65 balls.
Mendis was looking good for a big score and had even hit Hassan Ali for back-to-back sixes before getting out caught trying to complete the hat-trick. Mendis made 122 in 77 balls with 6 sixes and 14 fours to his name.
This was the fastest century in a World Cup game by any Sri Lankan batter. He got out when the Sri Lankan score was 218/3 in 28.5 overs.
But he received unanimous applause from the cricket fraternity on social media for his scintillating knock.
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