Rain, Extras and Sreesanth’s Bowling make India lose

India Vs. Sri Lanka dated 12-2-08

The match got off to a late start due to heavy rains and a wet outfield which reduced the match to 29 overs each. India got off to a good start and you could see some scintillating shots played by Sachin Tendulkar. The little master has given us this entertainment for a long time now and all Indians pray that he continues further. Gambhir and Rohit Sharma stabilized in the middle after India lost Sehwag and Tendulkar. Gambhir was looking dangerous when he threw away his wicket trying to go for a run which was never there. Dhoni and Rohit Sharma played fast and came up with a partnership of more than 50 within no time. Rohit Sharma played a superb knock and reached his highest score of 70 not out, thus proving his mettle once again. India reached 195 in 29 overs which looked like a healthy score.

However more rains meant Sri Lanka were required to make 154 runs in 21 overs. This made the match like a Twenty 20 which required that India needs to bowl tightly in order to stay in the match. However Sreesanth got off to a poor start and bowled a number of wides. In his 2nd over and the 3 rd over of the match he gave more than 20 runs and in his first 2 overs gave 34 runs. Thus having 38 runs on the scoreboard without loss in the first 3 overs meant that there would be no pressure on the Sri Lankan team. Another few extras more than 20 extras by the Indian team meant Sri Lanka had an easy chase. Thus they won the match with 8 wickets and 12 balls to spare.

The teamwork shown by the batting line up was destroyed by one bad performance in the field.

India may need to replace Sreesanth with either Munaf Patel or Praveen Kumar in the next match to see whether they can do better and have control on their line and length.