Desperate to beat India: Jayawardene

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The five-wicket defeat to India in a warm-up match ahead of the ICC Champions Trophy will have no significance when Sri Lanka square off against the same opponents in the semi-finals, said Mahela Jayawardene.
Jayawardene, who reached 11,000 ODI runs on Monday, said the defeat against India XI in a warm-up game in Birmingham on June 1 was history. The Indians easily chased down Lankan’s 333/5 with Virat Kohli and Dinesh Karthik scoring big centuries.
“Warm-up games or whatever, it doesn’t count right now. It’s a big tournament. It’s the semi-final, so looking forward to that,” said Jayawardene.
The Lankans beat Australia by 20 runs at the Oval on Monday to finish second in Group A.
Jayawardene scored an unbeaten 84 to win the Man of the Match award as Sri Lanka scored 253/8 in a must-win game.
While defending Nuwan Kulasekara took 3/42 and Rangana Herath scalped 2/48 to snuff out a late challenge by the Aussies. The Lankans are travelling to Cardiff on Tuesday to play the tournament’s second semi-final against India on Thursday.
On Wednesday, England take on South Africa in the first semi-final at the Oval.
Jayawardene, however, admitted that India’s batting looked very strong in the tournament.
“I think they’re playing some really good cricket. Their batting looks really strong, so those are key areas that we need to focus a bit on,” the former Lankan captain said.
On his personal milestone of reaching the 11,000-run club, Jayawardene said: “I didn’t feel anything. Obviously, pleased when the numbers came up. I can tonight probably reflect more on that achievement because we won the game as well. So importantly the contribution that I made towards the team is much more valuable for me.”
Jayawardene said Sri Lanka will be desperate to win the ICC Champions Trophy, a trophy which they shared with India after rain washed out the finals in 2002 in Colombo.
“I’ll be desperate for every game to win, simple as that. It’s not about trophies or whatever, it’s just to win matches. So I’ll have that same passion and same desperation to win games, doesn’t matter if it’s a semifinal or final or just a group game. As long as I have that attitude and the rest of the boys, we’ll go a long way,” he said.