Sport

Sri Lanka scores an emphatic win in the first ODI

Dambulla: Through discipline and control, Sri Lanka’s bowlers brought the Indian batting to its knees in game one of the five-match ODI series here at the Rangiri Dambulla Stadium on Monday.

The wickets were shared around like a potluck meal, as India, subject to sustained pressure, was bowled out for 146, its lowest score in Sri Lanka.

Ajantha Mendis and Muttiah Muralitharan helped themselves to three wickets apiece.

Although Munaf Patel picked up the Sri Lankan openers during a spell of splendid seam bowling on a strip that had the bowlers interested all day, offering as it did, bounce, cut, and turn, Mahela Jayawardene guided his side home.

The Sri Lankan captain batted with the steadiness of nerve and delicacy of touch that has built his legend.

Jayawardene’s unbeaten 61 (82b, 7x4), and his partnership of 102 with the wristy Chamara Kapugedera (45 n.o.), helped Sri Lanka complete an eight-wicket win, doing justice to the home side’s excellent all-round bowling performance earlier in the day.

After winning the toss, India shed three wickets to Sri Lanka’s opening bowlers, debilitating the base it required to handle Muralitharan and Mendis.

Gautam Gambhir, on who much rested after an ankle injury forced Virender Sehwag out, lasted two deliveries.

The left-handed opener has been in fine touch all tour, and — perversely—was due a failure.

With Kumar Sangakkara breathing down his neck, standing up to the stumps and threatening the two-step he has employed to great effect, Gambhir played outside a delivery that held its course from Chaminda Vaas’s left-arm-over angle and passed uninterrupted between bat and pad.

Nuwan Kulasekara struck a double blow, removing debutant Virat Kohli and No. 3 Suresh Raina.

Bowling with a breeze blowing across his left shoulder towards fine-leg, Kulasekara troubled Kohli with in-swing; the angle of the seam bred cut into the right-hander.

Kohli was trapped on the move by a break-back.

Raina then drove Kulasekara on the up, but could neither keep the ball on the ground nor clear the strategically positioned short-cover.

A brief partnership sprung up between Yuvraj Singh and Rohit Sharma. After the thinness of runs in the first two Power Plays, which saw 42 gathered in 15 overs, Yuvraj and Rohit appeared to make progress in the third.

Rohit sashayed down the track and swung Vaas over deep mid-wicket for six with the gentlest of strokes.

Yuvraj, dropped at second slip on 5, timed a couple sweetly, and Jayawardene introduced Mendis in the 20th over.

Into the next four balls was compressed intense drama — the sort that is rarely bestowed on the shorter formats. Mendis let Yuvraj have two carom balls: the first middle-finger-flicked creation snuck between bat and pad; the second raised a close appeal for leg-before.

Both times, the delivery’s angle in the air, away from the left-hander, drew the bat outside the line, while the cut off the wicket (into Yuvraj) imperilled the front pad.

Yuvraj had had enough, and he cracked the third delivery, which was slower, over long-on. Perceptible was the 26-year-old’s desperation.

The fourth was another carom ball.

It repeated the deeds of the first and the second, parting bat from pad, but went one further to take the inside edge on to the stumps.

Rohit dabbed a sharp Thilan Thushara delivery to slip, and India had lost its top five for 75 within the 21st over.

Dhoni and Pathan were victims of the pressure Mendis created with Muralitharan, the pair bowling successive maidens.

Dhoni tried to cut Mendis, but it went no further than slip; Pathan was unlucky, for he had inside-edged Muralitharan’s doosra on to his pad before being judged leg-before.

It was left to the lower-order to bring the total some respectability, and that they did admirably, taking the Indian total from 87 for seven to 146.

Ojha and Munaf added 29 for the last wicket — the second-best partnership of the innings, and certainly the most entertaining, with Munaf’s one-handed sweeps and monster hit for six off Muralitharan worth a few smiles on an otherwise bleak day.

Fall of wickets: 1-0 (Gambhir), 2-23 (Kohli), 3-36 (Raina), 4-73 (Yuvraj), 5-75 (Rohit), 6-87 (Dhoni), 7-87 (Irfan), 8-107 (Zaheer), 9-117 (Harbhajan).

Sri Lanka bowling: Vaas 9-0-34-1, Kulasekara 7-0-23-2, Thushara 6-0-18-1, Mendis 9-4-21-3, Muralitharan 10-2-37-3, Jayasuriya 5-1-9-0.

Sri Lanka: S. Jayasuriya c Irfan b Munaf 10, K. Sangakkara c &b Munaf 19, M. Jayawardene (not out) 61, C. Kapugedera (not out) 45; Extras (b-4, lb-3, w-5) 12. Total (for two wkts. in 34.5 overs): 147.

Fall of wickets: 1-18 (Jayasuriya), 2-45 (Sangakkara).

India bowling: Munaf 9-0-32-2, Zaheer 7-1-24-0, Irfan 7-0-35-0, Harbhajan 4-0-18-0, Ojha 3-0-9-0, Rohit 2.5-0-11-0, Raina 2-0-11-0.

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