When Sana and Kalu changed the 'Powerplay'

Today marks 29 years since Sanath Jayasuriya and Romesh Kaluwitharana opened the batting for the first time together in ODI Cricket against Australia in the Benson and Hedges World Series in 1996, which lasted only 17 runs but made a significant impact on the Cricket we know from this day forward.

Up until the 8th of January 1996, the average opening pair partnership in ODIs was only 3.8 runs per over (RPO) with Australia being the highest scorers at the time with 4.65 RPO, followed by West Indies who were in second place with 4.54 RPO (considering the period of 1st January 1990 to 8th January 1996). Zimbabwe (with much less matches played) and Pakistan were the only other teams in excess of 4 RPO while Sri Lanka was a tad behind New Zealand.

Overall as seen above, this was how the run rate for the opening pair was until Sri Lanka pulled a surprise move exactly 29 years back.

The Introduction of Two Aggressors

It was not very alien to send swashbuckling batters high up the order but teams would only employ at best just one batter of an aggressive nature and paired with an accumulator to hold the other end, or both batters would be slow scorers.

With the introduction of Romesh Kaluwitharana (a middle order batter who can score quickly) to open with Sanath who used to play with the long handle in the middle order and later play as an opener, the intention was to score the bulk of the runs while the fielding restrictions were in place in the opening overs.

Despite Sanath not firing as he would have liked to, it was Romesh who took charge that day and ended with 77 runs in 75 deliveries. Sri Lanka at the end of the day chased Australia's target of 214 runs with 15 balls to spare.

Here's a video of how the duo started the innings.

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