SA vs SL | Twitter in awe as Kusal Mendis stuns Marco Jansen with special edition of SKY's Supla

Sri Lanka had their work cut-out in the World Cup opener at Arun Jaitley Stadium after being set a target of 429 by the Proteas, a good 100 runs more than the highest successful chase in tournament history. Things went from bad to worse when opener Pathum Nissanka succumbed for a duck but the Lions' hopes were quickly reignited courtesy of a brilliant knock by Kusal Mendis. The explosive batter raced to a 25-ball half-century, on the back of three boundaries and six maximums, before any other batter in the team had even contributed a single run. To make it even more special, Mendis got to the milestone with two maximums and a boundary in the space of three balls, with the sequence including a shot for the highlight reels.

Mendis was up against Marco Jansen in the sixth over when the left-arm pacer pitched the third ball full and slightly outside off stump. The batter seemed to be simply waiting for the occasion as he preemptively shuffled across the crease before leaning to his right and slapping the ball over his left-arm shoulder. The delivery travelled miles behind the wicket and the extremity of talent displayed by Mendis was evident in Jansen's reaction, who simply stood his ground with glaring eyes and a sheepish smile on his face.

Mendis had a much deserved wide grin plastered across his face as it did not take Twitterati long to heap praise on the batter for pulling off the Suryakumar Yadav special with such ease.

Mendis's supla shot!!

This is fun

SKY stuff

Unreal

Crazy

Awesome

Ultimate madness

Crowd loving it!

50 in style