Chaminda Vaas's day

Chaminda Vaas is a weird bowler. He's your archetypal consistent medium-pacer these days. He's not too tall, he's not too fast, he doesn't do a great deal with the ball, but he's accurate. He's not all that, really. Then every now and again, conditions are in his favour and he's absolutely unplayable.

He was rather overshadowed by Farveez Maharoof today, but really it was Vaas who set things in motion. As an opening bowler, he sets the tone. Look at his figures: 2-6 off six overs. That's not very one-day international, is it?

Other Chaminda Vaas days have been the day when he took 8-19 against Zimbabwe - the only time anyone's ever taken eight wickets in a one-dayer. There was also the day when he took a hat trick with his first three balls against Bangladesh in the World Cup. Good days. Days that anyone would look back on with pride.

Chaminda Vaas is tremendously sunblock-happy at times.

Chaminda Vaas knows something about bowling that most people don't know - we don't know what it is though

Sri Lanka lost, but it wasn't Chaminda Vaas's fault. He took 2-16 off all ten of his overs and was left stranded, 29 not out as Sri Lanka's batsmen captiulated.

We're just thinking that Chaminda Vaas must be approaching world authority status when it comes to bowling on slow subcontinental pitches. There have been other bowlers, like Wasim Akram, who've bowled well on these sorts of tracks, but no-one who's actually preferred them other than Vaas.

Next time we're called upon to remove a well-set batsman in Jaipur, we're going to ask Chaminda Vaas what to do.