THE 2023 ICC Women’s T20 World Cup is just around the corner, and will see 10 teams from across the world battle it out in South Africa to be crowned World Champions for another three years.

In the lead up to the tournament, we here at Rookie Me Central will be previewing the teams one by one, and taking a deep dive into their chances at the upcoming tournament.

Next up, it is Sri Lanka.

Sri Lanka, like many countries in the early half of our preview series, is a nation outside the dominant women’s sides, but will be no doubt keen to change that this World Cup.

The odds are, unfortunately for the Sri Lankans ,very much stacked against them to progress far at this tournament though.

The last couple of years have not been kind to the them in terms of being able to play much international cricket.

They did not play any series’ between the 2020 World Cup and January last year, and since have only played two series against Pakistan and India respectively, the Commonwealth Games Qualifiers and then the Commonwealth Games mid last year.

They did not have to go to the qualifiers for this tournament, but with the lack of cricket they have played against the top sides in recent years, that may not be a good thing.

There is also the problem of relying on too few players.

Much like at the Commonwealth Games last year, there is going to be a lot of pressure on Chamari Athapaththu atop the batting order. If she fails than the Sri Lankans consistently find themselves in trouble.

However, this time around they have the services of Vishmi Gunaratne, who will hopefully take some pressure off Athapaththu.

Gunaratne is backing up from the recent Under 19 World Cup, where she was her country’s best batter, so she and the Sri Lankans will certainly be hoping she can continue that form in the senior tournament.

In terms of the bowlers, spinners Inoka Ranaweera and Sugandika Kumari will form the core of the attack, but there are plenty of pace options to compliment them too.

However the Sri Lankans will be missing the services of Hasini Perera who is set to miss the tournament after injuring her finger.  

Sri Lanka squad

Chamari Athapaththu (c), Oshadi Ranasinghe, Harshitha Samarawickrama, Nilakshi de Silva, Kavisha Dilhari, Anushka Sanjeewani, Kaushini Nuthyangana, Malsha Shehani, Inoka Ranaweera, Sugandika Kumari, Achini Kulasuriya, Vishmi Gunaratne, Tharika Sewwandi, Ama Kanchana, Sathya Sandeepani

Sri Lanka fixture (all dates local)

February 10 – South Africa
February 12 – Bangladesh
February 16 – Australia
February 19 – New Zealand