Do not think that the member of the press was actually worried about the home team's victory in the ensuing one-day series. He was rather concerned about whether the Lankans would be able to win all the matches by big margins to continue their exploits of Bangladesh.

Anything other than a whitewash of the visitors would be highly surprising for anybody here because Sri Lanka are not only in top form in Test cricket but also in the one-dayers.

"To me, margin is not the concern. The outcome is important. Our main objective is to win the series and it doesn't matter how you win it. You can't take the eyes off the ball when you play them. We just have to make sure we play the best cricket possible and be consistent about our all-round performance," said Jayawardene about his target.

The Sri Lankan skipper, however, recognised Bangladesh's improvement in one-day cricket but warned that his boys were determined to play their best.

"We always respected Bangladesh whenever we played them in Tests or ODIs, especially in ODIs where they can be a handful. They've shown that when we played them in Bangladesh. They beat us once and most importantly their World Cup performance was encouraging, so there is no scope to take them lightly," he added.

Not bothered by the absence of Chaminda Vaas and Muttiah Muralidaran, Jayawardene was excited with the return of veteran Sanath Jayasuriya, the most capped one-day cricketer who has 12,006 runs from with 395 ODIs and is just five wickets shy from the 300-mark.

"It's a good opportunity for the others without Vaas and Murali. Their absence is not going to put too much pressure on the rest. Sanath is fresh and wants to play one-day cricket again. He has played well for Lancashire and he had some really good games," said a confident Jayawardene.

Jayasuriya has smashed three hundreds and three half centuries in 15 matches. The left-hander, however, was not ready to use the word 'rate' after Bangladesh's World Cup run.

"You can't say how I rate Bangladesh after their World Cup performance because there are ups and downs in their performance even in one-day cricket. It was a tough game against them in the World Cup because we were under pressure after their victory against India in the first game," he observed.

He said that he believed in one mantra, that is 'hard work' and which is the reason behind his success even at the age of 38.

"I always believe in hard work. What I still believe is that I can still contribute for my team. That's why I retracted my retirement decision," said Jayasuriya, who is on the verge of achieving the unique feat of becoming the first man to score over 10,000 runs and grab 300 wickets.