England lost by eight wickets after they were skittled for 104 with Sri Lanka captain Chamari Athapaththu smacking 55 in quick time to secure victory for the tourists' with 40 balls to spare.
It levels the three-match T20 series ahead of today's decider in Derby and resulted in Knight facing questions over the decision with head coach Jon Lewis to experiment against the eighth best country in Twenty20 cricket.
Sophia Dunkley and Nat Sciver-Brunt Vitality were rested while England selected five players aged 22 or younger in Saturday's XI, but captain Knight defended their right to rotate with the T20 World Cup in Bangladesh only a year away.
Knight said: "We want to expose people to international cricket and we were pretty clear that was the goal at the start of this series.
"No one was saying anything at Hove when we smashed 180 off 17 overs so no, I wouldn't change a thing.
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