Sri Lanka has been playing cricket like chess. They have been playing upto potential on the field like some other field, but you'd notice a scheming strategist behind their World Cup campaign. We've discussed their strategy earlier too and had always backed them to be the finalists.
There are 2 theoretical possibilities:
1. The Joker plays to potential and wrecks the Australian batting line up
2. The Australian Team focuses on wrecking the Joker so much, that the other bowlers wreck the Team.
It's not whether they may win or not, but it is in their best interest not to show their Joker, who incidentally is also their least undocumented and studied weapon. This may not work for weaker teams, but when you have Vaas and Murali in the attack, you can take these chances. In comparison, Australia, is psychologically weaker in the spin department - with the exit of Shane Warne, the big match player. Hogg, who is kind of a similar unexposed/ undocumented weapon on their end, doesn't exactly categorize as a "different" bowler in terms as Murali on Malinga would. And without the big stage exposure - I expect Jayasuriya (if McGrath doesn't get him) to take him to the cleaners. It's going to be an interesting battle nevertheless.
Onedayers.com has a different Ranking System than the ICC and am sure if you go by this, you'd be better off at predicting in the Twenty20 World Cup. I used the same system to predict the following:
It also put Sri Lanka as the team to watch for before the World Cup if Jayasuriya maintains his form.
It predicted Jayasuriya as the man to watch for!
Well, in the final match I'd put my money on Sri Lanka, since both teams have a successful set of bowlers and batsmen, but Sri Lanka have a huge variety in their bowling.
ODI Bowler Rankings 2007 (all teams)
The ODI Bowler's Ranking 2007 is out! in the second edition of Vineet’s Cricket Rankings (Check out the ODI Bowler Rankings 2006 here)! And there are lots of surprises here, but then there are some faces we discovered last year and they still maintain their ranking, proving that they were no flukes, and that includes Varaiya of Kenya! The biggest setback was that the bangladesh bowlers who did exceedingly well in 2006 are now languishing with only Syed Rasel remaining near his last year ranking. Instead Sri Lanka has 5 bowlers in Top 30 this time.Indian cricket players to earn more under the new (proposed) contract
Did they tell you that Indian cricket players to earn more under the new (proposed) contract? Check out some important $tati$tic$ everyone has been hiding...Sri Lankan strategy fluxoms Ponting
Sri Lanka rested 3 bowlers, Lasitha Malinga (the find of the world cup), Chaminda Vaas (their deep throat) and Mutthaiah Muralitharan (the best spinner in the world cup) when they faced Australia in their league match. This strategy has been questioned by all and sundry. Basically this was a strategem (a gem of a strategy)