Sri Lankan class sinks Scotland

Scotland battled hard but nonetheless suffered defeat by a predictably wide margin in Monday's World Cup warm-up match against Sri Lanka at the 3Ws Oval.

The statistical chasm of 159 runs between the Scots and their illustrious opponents was a fair reflection of a match in which Craig Wright's men managed fleeting moments of encouragement but could never sustain the semblance of an even contest.

Sri Lanka were made to work for their 294 for seven - featuring half-centuries from Kumar Sangakkara (81), Sanath Jayasuriya (77) and Upul Tharanga (70) - and once Scotland's reply had lost three early wickets, there was little doubt they would fall well short of the target.

Fraser Watts went lbw, pushing slightly across a full ball from left-arm swing exponent Chaminda Vaas, and his opening partner Majid Haq was surprised soon afterwards to see his off bail dislodged after missing an attempted off-drive at the same bowler.

In between, number three Navdeep Poonia went for a second-ball duck - although he appeared to feel he had got some bat on a delivery from Lasith Malinga which saw him off lbw.

That left Gavin Hamilton and Ryan Watson to try to repair 35 for three - which they managed to a degree until the latter was caught driving to cover off Farveez Maharoof.

Top scorer Hamilton had a couple of mini-triumphs against Muttiah Muralitharan, driving the master off-spinner for four when he began his spell with a full toss and later reverse-sweeping another boundary.

That, though, was as good as it got for Wright's team.

The innings eventually petered out - especially after Hamilton chipped a simple catch to mid-on off Jayasuriya's left-arm spin - to 132 all out, Sri Lanka sharing out the wickets to win with almost nine overs unused.

Scotland could be satisfied earlier, however, that they never allowed themselves to be overrun in the field - despite some punishing hitting from Jayasuriya in particular.