Sachin Tendulkar came to the party and Barabati had a ball. Till Dinesh Karthik spoilt the mood of the capacity crowd a wee bit with some unwanted heroics right at the end to deny the maestro a shot at his 46th ODI century.
Not used to getting overshadowed match after match, as the Dilshans and Sehwags have dared to do in recent times, the Little Master carved out a classic unbeaten 96 (104 balls, 13x4), but was left left high and dry tantalisingly close to his 89th international hundred as Karthik hit a six and four to close the gap and there weren’t enough runs to get to the target and the milestone.
In the end, India galloped to 242 for 3 in 42.4 overs after Ravindra Jadeja’s career-best spell (4 for 32 off 10 overs) had defused the threatening Lankan charge to stop them at a meagre 239 in 44.2 overs.
A target of 240 was not going to test India unless they suffered a Sri Lanka-like collapse. Virender Sehwag ensured a rollicking launch (44 off 28 balls, 9x4), quickly bringing down the asking rate to 4 and a half, and then Sachin took over.
He was in no rush and eschewed risk by playing straight in the early phase. Among his bouquet of boundaries were three sublime cover drives. As the spinners came on, he gave Ajantha Mendis and Suraj Randiv the treatment —- the paddle sweep, the flicks and the drives flowed sweetly off his bat. There was a typically cheeky four over the keeper’s head as well, off Nuwan Kulasekara.
Gautam Gambhir (32) and Yuvraj Singh (23) missed out, but it didn’t matter as Sachin had decided to take matters in his hand.
The Lankan innings, after Sangakkara opted to set a target for a change, threw up two starkly contrasting phases. A whirlwind start, courtesy Dilshan, saw them raising 50 in 3.4 overs —- the fastest by any side against India. Despite the mind-boggling pace being slowed down after the departure of Dilshan, the Lankans still maintained an impressive run-rate to reach 165 for one in the 23rd over.
Then came the nosedive, which saw them losing nine wickets for 74 in 21 overs. The top-3 contributed 160, while the next 8 could muster just 79!
There was turn for the spinners, but it was hardly a wicket to justify such a stunning collapse. The skipper triggered it, with a moment of indiscretion. Having batted with characteristic fluency and grace to race to 46, Kumar Sangakkara (46 off 41 balls, 3x4, 1x6) charged Virender Sehwag, got outfoxed by his opposite number who held the ball back a bit, to be stumped by Dinesh Karthik albeit at the second attempt.
Having settled down to play the anchor’s role, Tharanga (73 off 81 balls, 6x4, 1x6) perished almost against the run of play, done in by Jadeja’s arm ball. That was the beginning of a dream spell by the Saurashtra left-arm spinner.
Mahela Jayawardene, short of runs since his epic double hundred in the first Test, did not do justice to his talent on this day either. He pottered around for two off 12 balls before pulling a long hop from Harbhajan Singh into Suresh Raina’s lap at midwicket.
Having opened up the fragile and inexperienced Lankan middle-order, the Indians went for the kill.
Not used to getting overshadowed match after match, as the Dilshans and Sehwags have dared to do in recent times, the Little Master carved out a classic unbeaten 96 (104 balls, 13x4), but was left left high and dry tantalisingly close to his 89th international hundred as Karthik hit a six and four to close the gap and there weren’t enough runs to get to the target and the milestone.
In the end, India galloped to 242 for 3 in 42.4 overs after Ravindra Jadeja’s career-best spell (4 for 32 off 10 overs) had defused the threatening Lankan charge to stop them at a meagre 239 in 44.2 overs.
A target of 240 was not going to test India unless they suffered a Sri Lanka-like collapse. Virender Sehwag ensured a rollicking launch (44 off 28 balls, 9x4), quickly bringing down the asking rate to 4 and a half, and then Sachin took over.
He was in no rush and eschewed risk by playing straight in the early phase. Among his bouquet of boundaries were three sublime cover drives. As the spinners came on, he gave Ajantha Mendis and Suraj Randiv the treatment —- the paddle sweep, the flicks and the drives flowed sweetly off his bat. There was a typically cheeky four over the keeper’s head as well, off Nuwan Kulasekara.
Gautam Gambhir (32) and Yuvraj Singh (23) missed out, but it didn’t matter as Sachin had decided to take matters in his hand.
The Lankan innings, after Sangakkara opted to set a target for a change, threw up two starkly contrasting phases. A whirlwind start, courtesy Dilshan, saw them raising 50 in 3.4 overs —- the fastest by any side against India. Despite the mind-boggling pace being slowed down after the departure of Dilshan, the Lankans still maintained an impressive run-rate to reach 165 for one in the 23rd over.
Then came the nosedive, which saw them losing nine wickets for 74 in 21 overs. The top-3 contributed 160, while the next 8 could muster just 79!
There was turn for the spinners, but it was hardly a wicket to justify such a stunning collapse. The skipper triggered it, with a moment of indiscretion. Having batted with characteristic fluency and grace to race to 46, Kumar Sangakkara (46 off 41 balls, 3x4, 1x6) charged Virender Sehwag, got outfoxed by his opposite number who held the ball back a bit, to be stumped by Dinesh Karthik albeit at the second attempt.
Having settled down to play the anchor’s role, Tharanga (73 off 81 balls, 6x4, 1x6) perished almost against the run of play, done in by Jadeja’s arm ball. That was the beginning of a dream spell by the Saurashtra left-arm spinner.
Mahela Jayawardene, short of runs since his epic double hundred in the first Test, did not do justice to his talent on this day either. He pottered around for two off 12 balls before pulling a long hop from Harbhajan Singh into Suresh Raina’s lap at midwicket.
Having opened up the fragile and inexperienced Lankan middle-order, the Indians went for the kill.
No comments:
Post a Comment