Chamari Athapaththu pride at Sri Lanka progress ahead of T20 World Cup

It was a performance befitting the most decorated player in the history of Sri Lankan women's cricket.

Star batter and captain Chamari Athapaththu had enjoyed a fairly low key Women’s T20 World Cup Qualifier, managing to reach a half century only once, in the group phase against Scotland.

But taking on the Scots again in the final – with qualification for the World Cup in Bangladesh safely in the bag – Athapaththu decided the time was right to go through the gears and remind the world of her immense talent.

A sparkling 63-ball 102 followed, guiding her team to a 68-run victory at Zayed Cricket Stadium in Abu Dhabi on Tuesday, which meant Sri Lanka had finished the 10-team tournament undefeated after seven weeks on the road.

“We have been playing good cricket as a team in recent times as compared with the previous years, with wins over New Zealand, England, South Africa and now coming on top at the T20 World Cup qualifiers,” Athapaththu told The National before boarding the flight back home on Wednesday.

“Right now, the focus is only on the World Cup. I think we are peaking at the right time with some pretty good results behind us.”

She believes the success is due to the changes implemented by the new coach Rumesh Ratnayake, the former Sri Lanka international, who was also in interim charge of the men’s team in 2017.

“He created a different culture in the dressing room,” added Athapaththu. “New ideas and planning, and then the executions of those plans in both training and matches. He made the girls believe in their abilities and we got stronger as a group.

“Previously, I used to score and perform but we still ended up losing the game. Now we are winning because of the contributions from every player. We always talked