Bhuvneshwar, Kohli masterminds of India’s whitewash triumph

Mangalore Today News Network

Sep 04, 2017: A proud cricketing nation’s fortunes continued to dwindle on September 3,  Sunday  as they allowed a visiting nation to trump them 5-0 at home in the 50-over format for the first time in their cricketing history. India completed a six-wicket win in the final game in Colombo as Sri Lanka succumbed to another morale-sapping defeat.

Plenty of talk ahead of the game revolved around a potential embarrassing whitewash at the hands of their neighbours and the team changes at the toss clearly indicated who wanted the win badly. While India continued to experiment by making four changes to their playing XI, Sri Lanka welcomed Upul Tharanga back in place of Kusal Mendis, who was given a break.

India dropped KL Rahul and brought back Kedar Jadhav in his place as Manish Pandey held on to his spot following an unbeaten half-century in the previous game. Jadhav repaid the faith with a well-constructed half-century and was involved in a century stand with his skipper Virat Kohli, who became only the third player in history to hit 30 ODI tons.

Kohli showed tremendous determination and applied himself after India lost Rohit Sharma and Ajinkya Rahane early in the chase. Rahane, who replaced Shikhar Dhawan, looked out of touch right from the outset against Lasith Malinga. After surviving a close lbw shout, Rahane eventually fell to the veteran when he mistimed a pull. Rohit, who was outstanding form in this series, played an uncharacteristic stroke with fine leg up in the circle in the powerplay. His attempt to scoop Vishwa Fernando backfired as he failed to clear the bowler.

Pandey and Kohli then stitched together a useful stand to bail India out of trouble on a day they decided to play five proper bowlers, with Bhuvneshwar Kumar slotted to come in at No.7. Pandey began with a boundary past mid on off Malinga and Kohli then followed suit with back-to-back off boundaries off Fernando, that included a straight swat past the bowler off a free hit.

With India fetching 53 off the powerplay, the required run rate was never going to bother them. Tharanga introduced spinners from both ends but the batsmen played them cautiously with the track offering a bit of assistance. Even though the boundaries had dried up at that stage, the scorecard kept moving at a decent pace. The introduction of Milinda Siriwardana helped India’s cause as Kohli feasted on his bowling to fetch three boundaries with the first one raising his half-century in the 23rd over.

Sri Lanka finally ended the stand when Malinda Pushpakumara ended Pandey’s innings with India needing another 111 for victory. The Karnataka batsman mistimed a slog and that opened the gates for Jadhav to make a mark. After having issues against Akila Dananjaya earlier in the series, Jadhav was determined to make the opportunity count.

With Kohli taking a backseat, Jadhav kept scoring at almost run-a-ball and eventually reached his second half-century much to his relief. Kohli then equaled Ricky Ponting’s tally of 30 hundreds in the format with a single to the right of point in the 43rd over and with victory firmly in sight, the celebrations remained muted. Even though Jadhav fell when India were two short of a win, Kohli and MS Dhoni, who earlier in the day became the first wicketkeeper to inflict 100 stumpings in ODIs, went on to complete the formalities.

The victory, though, was set up by India’s seamers in the afternoon. Sri Lanka surprised a few with their decision to bat first again. The decision probably came on the back of India scoring 375 on the same surface in the previous game but considering the cloud cover and the possibility of rain interrupting later on, they could have opted to bowl first. There was also a half an hour delay to kickstart proceedings due to a slight drizzle.

Tharanga announced his return in style by cracking a boundary each off Bhuvneshwar and Shardul Thakur in the first two overs. Bhuvneshwar came back with a strong response in his second over as he got rid of Niroshan Dickwella with a knuckle ball which was chipped back at him. He changed pace yet again to quickly remove Dilshan Munaweera, who clearly looked out of sorts in his short stay.

Despite the early setbacks, Tharanga continued to plunder boundaries at will much to the delight of the home crowd but when Jasprit Bumrah got one to slant across and take his outside edge, Sri Lanka found themselves in familiar territory, having to rebuild from scratch. It was an ideal situation for the likes of Lahiru Thirimanne and Angelo Mathews to get themselves in and with the track also taking some turn, the duo fought their way to a fighting century stand - Sri Lanka’s first in the series.

Thirimanne brought up his half-century off 83 balls. Mathews, at the other end, took 80 balls to get to his second successive fifty in the series. Despite taking their time, and with the run rate close to five after 38 overs, Sri Lanka were well placed to switch gears and make use of the platform. But the script entered familiar territory yet again with the Sri Lankans falling like a pack of cards at a crucial juncture. Bhuvneshwar accounted for Thirimanne by cramping him for room and disturbing his timber and Kuldeep Yadav sent Mathews back to the pavilion.

Jasprit Bumrah and Bhuvneshwar then did the clean up job as the home side yet again failed to touch 250 in the series. A familiar tale was met with a familiar outcome in the end!

Brief scores: Sri Lanka 238 in 49.4 overs (Lahiru Thirimanne 67, Angelo Mathews 55; Bhuvneshwar Kumar 5-42, Jasprit Bumrah 2-45) lost to India 239/4 in 46.3 overs (Virat Kohli 110*, Kedar Jadhav 63; Wanidu Hasaranga 1-29) by six wickets.

Courtesy: cricbuzz.com