Shane Bond could hardly believe what was happening on his comeback to international cricket - then Kumar Sangakkara struggled to comprehend how Sri Lanka botched their Twenty20 run chase.
New Zealand weathered an early onslaught from Tillakaratne Dilshan to record their first win on tour, by three runs at R Premadasa Stadium tonight.
Dilshan helped himself to four consecutive fours in Bond's opening over as he powered his way to 57 off 28 deliveries to ignite Sri Lanka's pursuit of a victory target of 142.
But once Dilshan was dismissed in the eighth over New Zealand's bowlers dominated to help secure their team a morale-boosting win.
The other three overs of Bond's allocation cost only 11 runs while Jacob Oram's hat-trick and captain Daniel Vettori's figures of two for 11 from four overs helped restrict Sri Lanka to 138 for nine.
Vettori lauded a "complete performance" once seamer Ian Butler and Jesse Ryder combined to get rid of danger man Dilshan.
Ryder took an excellent catch at backward point, following his direct hit to run out Mahela Jayawardene for three.
"Dilshan was always going to be the big wicket and once we got him the spirits lifted," Vettori said.
"He's playing exceptionally well and when he's in full flight like that it's hard to know how to stop him.
"Fortunately once we did we put together a really complete performance.
"I'm satisfied with the way we fought back. I think everyone's been wanting to see that fight and in this game we really showed it."
Dilshan departure with his team's score at 75 for four exposed a lower middle order and tail that was also a Sri Lankan shortcoming in the test series.
"We always thought if we could get down to the Sri Lankan lower middle order we could put some real pressure on them," Vettori said.
Sangakkara described his team's batting effort as "inexcusable".
"It's hard to imagine how we lost it but we did. Dilshan gave the best start we could ask for but the rest of the batting was not up to scratch," he said.
Sangakkara did not spare himself from blame, describing his chip to Brendon McCullum as a "soft" dismissal.
"All the players have to take a long, hard look at themselves," he said.
The second and final Twenty20 match is at the same venue starting on Friday night (starting at 1.30am on Saturday (NZT). Link...
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