Sri Lanka captain Dimuth Karunaratne has acknowledged the challenge of facing an ‘unpredictable’ Pakistan side, but expressed confidence in his team going into their third match of the 2019 Men’s Cricket World Cup in Bristol on June 7.

Despite a batting collapse (144-1 to 201 all out), the Sri Lankans clinched a 34-run win via the DLS method against Afghanistan in their previous game. Karunaratne admitted that there are areas to improve, but stated that the management will refrain from tinkering too much with the batting order, calling it the ‘best batting line-up’ they can produce.

“We have some areas to improve in batting. The change in the batting line-up [after the New Zealand game] was because I wanted to make sure we got a good start. I think we don’t want to change many things. I know Kusal (Perera), what he can do because I’ve played with him a lot of times.

“I want to give him a chance to go for it and give him the licence, a free hand, and then if someone gets out, (Lahiru) Thirimanne can go there and play the anchor role. I think this is the best batting line-up we can produce.”

Sri Lanka have a woeful record against Pakistan in World Cups, losing all seven games they have played against each other to date. Karunaratne, however, is not reading too much into history.

“We may not have won against Pakistan in the World Cup but it doesn’t bother us. It’s just another one-day international for us so if we perform well on that day we can win,” he said.

“Pakistan is an unpredictable team but we are also coming into this game having won one and lost one. We were low in confidence but we will give our best shot to beat them.”

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