We deserved to lose despite Malinga's spell : Jayawardene

Georgetown, Guyana, Mar 29 (UNI) Sri Lanka skipper Mahela Jayawardene bluntly admitted that they deserved to lose their first Super Eight tie against the Proteas despite Lasith Malinga's magical spell that nearly won the tense match for them.

''After scoring 209 against South Africa it is a tall order to win the match. It was Malinga who created the opportunity. He almost won it for us.

''But we lost at the end and I do not regret that. Perhaps it will make us stronger in the future games of the World Cup,'' he said in his post match press conference.

However, the skipper lauded the fighting spirit of his teammates, saying, ''We do not lose hope and fight till the end and we have seen good results out of no win positions in the past also.'' He admitted that the batsmen failed to get 30-40 run more which could have tilted the match in their favour. ''We won the toss and elected to bat feeling that in the morning scoring would be easier with ball coming on to the bat.

''But after five down for 90 , we should not expect much. Dilshan and Russel added crucial runs and we were 196 for five. But once again we lost the momentum and eventually got out for much less than what we looked for,''Jayawardene rued.

Giving credit to the bowlers, he said,''We knew that pitch would slow down and we had Murali and Sanath in our armour. They did bowl superbly and I brought Murali in three spell and he created the first opening, removing two wickets in two balls and finally Malinga almost brought home the game.'' ''South Africa played really well and despite the last five over, they outplayed us throughout the day. At the end we got some local support also. We were actually not disappointed at the result. This has given us further strength,'' he asserted.

UNI