Dravid and Dhoni steer India to victory
Chris Dhambarage in Goa
CRICKET: A brilliant century partnership between Rahul Dravid and
Mahendra Singh Dhoni set up a five wicket victory for India in the third
one day international against Sri Lanka at the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium
in Fatorda, Margao, here on Wednesday.
The pair added 133 runs for the fifth wicket in 139 deliveries as
India successfully chased a total of 230 runs with three overs to spare.
Skipper Dravid hit a splendid 66 from 83 balls with one six and four
fours while Dhoni remained unbeaten on 67 with four boundaries having
faced 74 balls.
The pair came into bat at a critical stage of the innings when Sri
Lanka had turned things around and looked like making a match of it
despite defending a modest total of 230 runs. The Lankans did well to
reduce the Indians to 94 for 4 after an early flourish from Sourav
Ganguly and Yuvraj Singh.
But Dravid and Dhoni completely changed the situation with some
intelligent batting which helped the Indians to level the series at one
all with the fourth and final match to be played on Saturday in
Vishakapatnam. Dravid’s innings was quite a significant one as he
completed ten thousand runs in one day international while scoring his
77th one day international half century.
Earlier Russel Arnold hit a fighting half century to lift Sri Lanka
to a respectable 230 for 8 after having elected to bat first. The
elegant left hander justified his inclusion in the World Cup squad by
stroking an unbeaten 66 from 83 balls with seven boundaries.
This was a typical innings from Arnold who survived the initial
stages before deciding to play more freely during the latter part of the
innings. He just did not have that support from the other end but still
managed to carry his team to a safe position after they had been reduced
to six for three wickets and again at 91 for 5.
Arnold walked into the middle at a time when the Lankans were
struggling to put a decent score on the board with Zaheer Khan ripping
through the top order during a hostile opening spell which earned him
the man of the match award.
The left arm paceman made early inroads into the Sri Lankan batting
while claiming the wickets of Sanath Jayasuriya, Upul Tharanga and Kumar
Sangakkara during his opening three overs.
The former captain Marvan Atapattu joined skipper Mahela Jayawardena
and the pair made a desperate attempt to rescue the team with a fourth
wicket stand of 76 runs off 109 deliveries. Jayawardena of course was
rather unfortunate to have given out leg before wicket off the bowling
of Harbhajan Singh having struck three beautiful fours during his knock
of 30.
Marvan Atapattu was just beginning to show his old form but his
innings was cut short at 42 having stroked half a dozen of boundaries
while facing 62 deliveries. Sri Lanka were now down to their last
recognised pair of Tillekeratne Dilshan and Russel Arnold who did well
to pull the team out of trouble to a great extent.
Their sixth wicket partnership of 91 runs of course was not a
dominant one but yet they succeeded in adding some kind of pressure on
the Indians during the last few overs of the innings.
Neither Dilshan or Arnold managed to get on top of the bowling but
still they collected more than five runs per over without taking a risk.
Their effort also established a new ground record erasing the
previous stand of 63 runs set by another Sri Lankan pair of Hashan
Tillekeratne and Aravinda de Silva against Australia in 1989.
Dilshan eventually lost his concentration when he was well in sight
of another half century having struck five boundaries. But Arnold held
his nerves despite the amount of pressure and added the finishing
touches while putting on a useful 26 runs for the unfinished ninth
wicket from 23 balls together with Nuwan Kulasekera.
Sri Lanka made one change to their side that won the second one dayer
in Rajkot on Sunday while replacing Lasith Malinga with Dilhara
Fernando.
Upul Tharanga lbw b Khan 1
Sanath Jayasuriya c Ganguly B Khan 2
Mahela Jayawardene lbw b Harbhajan Singh 30
Kumar Sangakkara b Khan 0
Marvan Atapattu c Tendulkar b Munaf Patel 42
Tillekaratne Dilshan c Dhoni b Singh 42
Russel Arnold not out 66
Farveez Maharoof c Agarkar b Khan 14
Malinga Bandara lbw b Khan 2
Nuwan Kulasekera not out 9
Extras (4b, 3lb, 11w, 4nb) 22
TOTAL (for eight wickets) 230
Batting time: 217 minutes. Overs: 50.
FALL OF WICKETS: 1-5, 2-5, 3-6, 4-82, 5-91, 6-180, 7-196, 8-204.
DID NOT BAT: Dilhara Fernando.
BOWLING: Zaheer Khan 10-0-42-5 (2w), Ajit Agarkar 10-2-40-0 (4w), Munaf Patel 10-2-41-1 (4nb), Harbhajan Singh 10-0-37-2, Sachin
Tendulkar 4-0-33-0 (5w), Virender Sehwag 6-0-30-0.
Saurav Ganguly lbw b Bandara 48
Virender Sehwag c Dilshan b Fernando 12
Sachin Tendulkar b Kulasekera 1
Yuvraj Singh c Kulasekera b Fernando 21
Rahul Dravid run out 66
Mahender Singh Dhoni not out 67
Dinesh Karthik not out 4
Extras (1lb, 10w, 3nb) 14
TOTAL (for five wickets) 233
FALL OF WICKETS: 1-20, 2-35, 3-83, 4-94, 5-227.
DID NOT BAT: Zaheer Khan, Harbhajan Singh, Ajit Agarkar and Munaf Patel.
BOWLING: Farveez Maharoof 8-0-37-0 (5w), Dilhara Fernando 10-1-43-2 (5w, 3nb), Nuwan Kulasekera 8.3-0-46-1, Malinga Bandara
10-0-46-1, Sanath Jayasuriya 7-0-34-0 Tillekaratne Dilshan 3-0-16-0.
Margao, Wednesday
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