The Singer World Series was a quadrangular

ODI cricket One Day International (ODI) is a format of cricket, played between two teams with international status, in which each team faces a fixed number of fifty overs, with the game lasting up to 7 hours. The World Cup, generally held every four year ...

tournament held in

Sri Lanka Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, also known historically as Ceylon, is an island country in South Asia. It lies in the Indian Ocean, southwest of the Bay of Bengal, separated from the Indian subcontinent, ...

from 26 August to 7 September 1996. It featured the national cricket teams of

Zimbabwe file:Zimbabwe, relief map.jpg, upright=1.22, Zimbabwe, relief map Zimbabwe, officially the Republic of Zimbabwe, is a landlocked country in Southeast Africa, between the Zambezi and Limpopo Rivers, bordered by South Africa to the south, Bots ...

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

and the hosts,

. The competition was won by Sri Lanka, which defeated Australia in the final.

Background

The Singer World Series was the first senior cricket tournament to be held in Sri Lanka after the

1996 Cricket World Cup The 1996 Cricket World Cup, also called the Wills World Cup 1996 for sponsorship reasons, was the sixth Cricket World Cup organised by the International Cricket Council (ICC). It was co-hosted by India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. The tournament wa ...

. Security threats due to the Sri Lankan Civil War and potential terrorist attacks from the

LTTE The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE; , ; also known as the Tamil Tigers) was a Tamil militant organization, that was based in the northern and eastern Sri Lanka. The LTTE fought to create an independent Tamil state called Tamil Eelam ...

had led Australia to refuse to visit Sri Lanka for their scheduled match in the island nation. This time, Australia agreed to participate amidst intensive security arrangements. Following their 1996 World Cup triumph, Sri Lanka had emerged as clear favourites. The Australian team was considered the most serious challenger to their prospects. Zimbabwe's struggling, lacklustre performances did not make them serious contenders. The Indian team had come off a string of successive ODI tournament defeats and a poor showing in their tour of England, which led to the replacement of the team captain

Mohammad Azharuddin Mohammad Azharuddin (born 8 February 1963) is an Indian politician and a former cricketer who also served as the Indian national cricket team's captain. He was a right-handed middle order batter and an occasional medium fast bowler. He playe ...

with his deputy,

Sachin Tendulkar Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar (; ; born 24 April 1973) is an Indian former international cricketer who List of India national cricket captains#Men's cricket, captained the Indian national team. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest cricketer ...

. The Singer World Series was to be Tendulkar's first ODI tournament leading the national team.

Squads

All three visiting sides had new captains, while Sri Lanka largely retained the team that had won the World Cup under veteran

Arjuna Ranatunga Deshamanya Arjuna Ranatunga (; ; born 1 December 1963), is a Sri Lankan politician and former cricketer, who was the 1996 Cricket World Cup winning captain for Sri Lanka, and scored the winning boundary in the final. He is regarded as the pion ...

's captaincy. Their 14-player squad was largely unchanged from the one that had claimed the World Cup. India had named a 14-player squad under the leadership of Sachin Tendulkar. It featured two debutants: fast-bowler David Johnson and off-spin bowler

Sunil Joshi Sunil Bandacharya Joshi (; born 6 June 1970) is an Indian former cricketer and former selector of the India cricket team. He played as an all-rounder who bowled slow left arm spin and batted left-handed. Sunil Joshi was appointed as chief sel ...

. The squad was being coached by retired Indian pace bowler

Madan Lal Madan Lal Udhouram Sharma (; born 20 March 1951) is a former Indian cricketer (1974–1987) and Indian national cricket coach. He was a member of the 1983 Cricket World Cup winning India squad. He was also a part of the Indian squad which won t ...

. Owing to Mark Taylor's back injury, wicket-keeper

Ian Healy Ian Andrew Healy (born 30 April 1964) is an Australian former international cricketer who played for Queensland domestically. A wicketkeeper and right-hand middle-order batsman, he first played international cricket in 1988, after six first ...

took over as captain of Australia's 13-player squad for the series, which included the debutants fast-bowler

Jason Gillespie Jason Neil Gillespie (born 19 April 1975) is an Australian cricket coach and former cricketer who played all three formats of the game. Jason Gillespie was appointed as the head coach for Pakistan's red-ball (Test) cricket team on April 28, 202 ...

, spin bowler

Brad Hogg George Bradley Hogg (born 6 February 1971) is a former Australian cricketer who played all formats of the game. He was a left-arm Left-arm unorthodox spin, wrist spin Bowler (cricket), bowler, and a lower-order left-handed batsman. His earlie ...

and batsman

Darren Lehmann Darren Scott Lehmann (born 5 February 1970) is an Australian cricket coach and former cricketer who coached the Australian national team. He is currently head coach at Northamptonshire County Cricket Club. Lehmann made his ODI debut in 1996 an ...

. Zimbabwe's 16-player squad was led by their new captain, Alistair Campbell, who had succeeded

Andy Flower Andrew Flower (born 28 April 1968) is a Zimbabwean cricket coach and a former cricketer. As a cricketer, he captained the Zimbabwe national cricket team and is widely regarded as the greatest Zimbabwean cricketer ever and one of the greatest wi ...

Points table

The tournament was organised in a round robin format, with each team playing each other once. – Points Table
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Matches

Final

Records and awards

Sri Lanka's vice-captain Aravinda de Silva won the player of the series award for amassing 334 runs in just 4 innings without losing his wicket, remaining unbeaten in all of them. Sri Lankan spin bowler Upul Chandana and Australian fast-bowler Glenn McGrath both took 7 wickets, but Chandana did so in only 3 matches to McGrath's 4.

References

External links

ESPN Cricinfo ESPNcricinfo (formerly known as Cricinfo or CricInfo) is a sports news website exclusively for the game of cricket. The site features news, articles, live coverage of cricket matches (including liveblogs and scorecards), and ''StatsGuru'', a ...

{{International cricket tours of Sri Lanka Singer World Series Singer World Series Singer World Series International cricket competitions from 1994–95 to 1997

Cricket Cricket is a Bat-and-ball games, bat-and-ball game played between two Sports team, teams of eleven players on a cricket field, field, at the centre of which is a cricket pitch, pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two Bail (cr ...