Asia Cup Final: India Score 81 Run Victory over Sri Lanka
India completed a much needed 81 run win over Sri Lanka in the final of the Asia Cup. The Indian team had been on a losing streak for a while, after a dismal performance in the T20 World Cup followed by a nightmare Tri-Series in Zimbabwe, where they lost twice to Zimbabwe and once to Sri Lanka. India needed this victory to win back the fans and more importantly silence the home media, who had been going to town against the Indian cricket team.
The win can be termed more important considering the fact that their senior most and most informed player in ODIs (before T20 World Cup), Sachin Tendulkar, was not part of the team. Another important absentee was the stylish left hander Yuvraj Singh, and add to that not having their most dangerous opening batsman Virender Sehwag. Indian Captain MS Dhoni really was shorthanded to a great degree.
Dhoni, after winning the toss, chose to bat first, on a pitch that did look batting friendly at first, but as the game went on it slowed down and the ball was difficult to time. Dinesh Karthik, with 66 at the top of the order, was the top scorer. The Indian batting fell apart in the middle period, but Rohit Sharma, with a solid knock of 41, took the score to 268 for the loss of 6 wickets in the allotted 50 overs.
In reply, Sri Lanka could not have gotten off to a worse start, as their ace batsman Dilshan, who had been in good form in recent games, was sent back without scoring a single run. He was caught by Harbhajan Singh on the bowling of Praveen Kumar.
Indians smelled blood and started putting more pressure on the hosts with some more close in fielders. The pressure paid off as Tharanga, while going for a big drive, let one through against Zaheer Khan. Tharanga scored 16 from 30 balls with just a single boundary.
Much was depending on the experienced pair of Jayawardene and Sangakkara in the middle order, as both senior men had been performing consistently well in recent games. However, after just putting on 19 runs for the 3rd wicket, Jayawardene was caught by Zaheer Khan on the bowling of Ashish Nehra for 17 from 38 balls. He scored only 2 boundaries.
And just 2 balls later, their talented all rounder Angelo Mathews was also knocked over by Nehra; he was caught behind for naught. The collapse did not stop just there, as pretty much the last hope for Sri Lanka, their captain Sangakkara was picked up by Nehra in his next over for his 3rd wicket in 2 overs. Sangakkara scored 17 runs from 38 balls with 2 boundaries.
Kandamby and Kapugedera, the 2 all rounders, came to rebuild the innings, putting on 53 runs for the 6th wicket. Kandamby was the next to go after scoring 31 from 45 balls (including 2 boundaries). He was the victim of a suicidal run out.
Sri Lanka, at 104 for 6, were all but gone. Kapugedera at the other end though continued to fight on his own. Maharoof came in to join him but was not much help; Maharoof only scored 10 from 14 balls before being caught behind on the bowling of Zaheer Khan.
Fast bowler Kulasekara, though, showed some sensible batting and put together 36 runs alongside Kapugedera, but the target was still some distance away.
Kulasekara became Jadeja’s first victim as he tried to go for a big shot and was left stranded in middle of the wicket while Dhoni whipped off the bails. Kulasekara scored 20 from 16 balls with 4 boundaries. The rest of the 2 wickets were cleaned up in no time, as Sri Lanka folded for only 187, handing India an 81 run win to win their 5th Asian cup. Sri Lanka failed to complete hat tricks of Asia cups. Dinesh Karthik was declared man of the match for his 66 runs. Shahid Afridi was declared the player of the series.
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