Team India registered a massive 41-run victory over hosts Sri Lanka as Kuldeep Yadav shined with four wickets at the R Premadasa Stadium in Colombo, on Tuesday, 12 September.
While it was Sri Lanka’s spinners who ran through India’s batting order in the first innings of the game, it was India’s pace attack that wrought havoc on the batters in the powerplay.
Sri Lanka then lost their next two batters in rapid succession after Jasprit Bumrah returned to trap Kusal Mendis on his slower delivery in the 7th over, followed by Mohammad Siraj's exquisite outswinger to dismiss Dimuth Karunaratne.
After almost 10 relatively quiet overs, left-arm wrist spinner Kuldeep Yadav struck twice to get rid of Sadeera Samarawickrama (17) and Charith Asalanka (22). Batting at number 6, Dhananjaya de Silva was fighting back to recover from the losses alongside skipper Dasun Shanaka but the latter was sent back soon after as Ravindra Jadeja did the trick for India.
De Silva (41 off 66) then went on to stitch together a solid 69-run seventh-wicket partnership with Wellalage who had starred with the ball but was caught by Shubman Gill on a Jadeja delivery whilst attempting a boundary.
Just when Wellalage was inching towards his gritty fifty, the Sri Lankan innings came to an end a few overs later when Maheesh Theekshana and Matheesha Pathirana were lost to Kuldeep Yadav.
Clean Sweep From Sri Lankan Spinners
Earlier in the first innings, spinners Wellalage and Asalanka combined to take 9 wickets to bowl India out before 50 overs.
In what is their third consecutive day on the field, team India got off to a strong start, as the opening duo of Rohit Sharma and Shubman Gill were almost replicating their fiery form from two days ago at the same venue and in the process the Indian skipper went on to complete 10000 runs in One Day Internationals.
But the joy was fleeting as Wellalage produced a jaffa to get rid of Shubman Gill and two overs later removed last match’s centurion Virat Kohli to swing the game in favour of the hosts.
In his very next over, Wellalage worked his magic yet again, this time he caught the big fish: Indian captain Rohit Sharma and just after India reached the 150-run mark, Wellage broke the blooming Rahul-Kishan partnership as he caught & bowled the comfortable looking Rahul.
Four overs later, he returned to complete his 5-wicket haul by scalping Hardik Pandya’s wicket.
Lankan off-spinner Charith Asalanka accounted for the remaining four wickets in a scintillating bowling display as he removed the likes of Ishan Kishan, Ravindra Jadeja, Jasprit Bumrah and Kuldeep Yadav in quick successions.
All-rounder Axar Patel and Mohammed Siraj were holding the fort before there was yet another rain interruption in the Asia Cup in the 47th over of India’s innings. After a brief break, the action resumed, and spinner Maheesh Theekshana put the final nail in India’s coffin by dismissing Axar Patel to restrict them at 213 in 49.1 overs.
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