Story India Embarks On an International Season- so does the whole world

[sachinisgod]

Then it was Jammy's turn to be fooled by Chandana - the pick of the bowlers. He misread the flight and he was on his way back.

Dravid's final spider made for interesting reading.

Ganguly meanwhile was stroking the ball beautifully. An exquisite square cut from the offside Maharaja(click):

Ganguly scored his fifty quicker than his deputy. In just 43 balls.

Ganguly scored all over the park and this is how his wagonwheel is looking as he came in for Tea.

 

[sachinisgod]

Indian Scorecard at Tea

India's batting stats at Tea

SL's poor bowling is shown in a tabular format here:

 

[sachinisgod]

Stumps Day 1, India 550/9

Sunny: Well, well India have reached a huge score on the first day breaking all previous records.(Sunny's not aware of brad's thread ).

Shastri: Yes Sunny. Though they got a few jerks in the third session with wickets of Laxman and Ganguly falling quickly, Harbhajan Singh and Dinesh Karthik counter attacked beautifully.

Sunny: Yes perhaps too beautifully for the Lankans' comfort. They power-boosted the runrate and Bhajji esp. had forgotten the childhood batting defense lessons. The moment he steps in something,s got to happen. This time it did happen, Bhajji hit his maiden test century and that too in 56 balls. Exhillarating stuff.

Shastri: Yes, those 5 sixes were really huge. All at the same place and thrice he sent the ball out of the ground. But I think Dinesh Karthik played a nice cameo by supporting Bhajji very well. Its sad that he missed out on his maiden fifty.

Sunny: Well it has been a day full of misses for the Indians. Rahul and Saurav missed out on the tons. Karthik and three top order batsmen came pretty close to 50 and then let it go. They should learn that when they have put in so much effort( ) to get in, they should put a value tag on their wicket and try hard to make their effort count.

Shastri: What did you think of the Sri Lankans' effort? I think they did a very bad job of it except Upul Chandana who bagged a fiver (though an expensive one) and also held on to one or two catches.

Sunny: Yes all others bowled really poor, esp. Fernando and Vaas, they'll definitely want to forget today's figures. Fernando got two wickets but they were the result of Indians playing shots and not his better bowling. Also I can't dream of a reason why Attapattu held back Muralitharan till the 68th over. By then the maximum damage had been inflicted. It was pathetic captaincy.

Shastri: The only thing more pathetic was the Lankans' fielding today. The wicketkeeper Sangakara allowed umpteen number of byes through his gloves and the fielders corresponded with patchy catching and ground fielding.

Sunny: It was an overall more than satisfactory day for the Indians - scoring such a huge score on day 1, securing all the batting points available for the grab, and still there's one wicket to go with Pathan looking good. Though the biggest smile will be on the face of the sardar from Jalandhar.

Screens follow:

 

[sachinisgod]

Day 1 3rd Session Screens

First to go after tea was Laxman. As mentioned before he wasn't looking very fluent and he became the 4th victim of Chandana. Again LBW.

Then it was Ganguly's turn to miss out on a big ton. He just couldn't keep the cover drive down and was caught in the short cover region and thus gave Chandana his fifth wicket.

Just when Sri Lanka were thinking of cutting the Indian total short, the turbanator had some other ideas. He hit back in a belligerent way and reached his half century in no time.

Though he had to go through some pretty anxious moments, when he was nearly run out. But the TV replays showed him to be safe.

The third umpire's decision (click)

 

[sachinisgod]

On the other side, Dinesh Karthik was slowly inching towards his maiden test fifty but destiny and his instincts had something else in mind. He fell for 41 trying to hoick Fernando over long on. Chandana couldn't be kept out of action. He grabbed the easy catch (click).


Then came the moment that Bhajji and the whole of India was waiting for. The man famous for his hilarious batting had at last reached his maiden test ton. In doing so, he broke all existing Indian records and romped to 100 in 56 balls.

One of Bhajji's 5 sixes. One of the three times that the ball had to be changed due to him.(click)


Bhajji's way of batting didnt insure him against failure and he fell trying to drive Fernando. He scored exactly 100.


As he made his way back to the dressing room, the crowd sensed that they had watched an unique kind of innings and gave him a standing encore.

 

[sachinisgod]

Murali Karthik became the first victim of the match of the great controversial Muralitharan. Though this time he kept his flex withing 6-7 degrees and got Karthik LBW with a straight forward offsipnner.(click)


Kumble would have followed him and the Indian total would have been around 520 mark, but the fielder at mid-on had different ideas. (click)

 

[sachinisgod]

Cards and Graphics - Stumps Day 1

The Indian scorecard make a pretty decent viewing

The Indian batsmen would be proud of their batting stats today, though some of them would regret not being able to achieve more in good conditions.

The partnerships that they put up were quite good too. The best being the Karthik-Bhajji partnership for 7th wicket.

Out of all Indian batsment the most colorful spider was of Bhajji, but his scoring area was a bit limited.

 

[sachinisgod]

Sri Lanka's bowling performance would be praised if termed mediocre. Upul Chandana was the only player who emerged with his head held high. Fernando's two wickets cost him more than 50 a piece and Muralitharan too was expensive.

Stay tuned on day 2 to know how much do India score and how the Lankans reply to this mammoth total. With the Indian team full of spinners its going to be tough time for the home team.

Btw fellas, is this story so sopoforic? there are loads of hits but no reviews?

 

[sachinisgod]

Day 2 Rain Interruption

Harsha Bhogle: It looks a bit murky here in Colombo, but the play is going to start within no time. Let's take the viewers direct to the action.

Kumble got a reprieve on Day 1 but Pathan was not so lucky...India's last wicket fell after adding 8 more runs in one over and one ball. He was caught at mid-on.

Here's the Indian scorecard at the end of their innings:

India's batting card too made a nice reading:

But it wasn't the case with SL bowling card:

And then just as the Sri Lankan innings was about to begin, this happened:

The play didn't start till somewhere near 5:15 pm and hence just 10 overs were possible.

 

[sachinisgod]

Day 2 Stumps SL 47/1

Ranjit Fernando: Every viewer must have been glued to his seat but the rain played the spoil sport and allowed only 11.1 overs of play. Very disappointed Ravi!

Ravi Shastri: Yes Ranjit, we were anticipating that Sri Lanka would be able to fight back hard in their own style of meeting fire with fire but unfortunately it was not meant to be so. They got just 10 overs. What do you think of their reply in those 10 overs.

RF: Well they came up with a far positive reply then I anticipated and I think this can still be a very good test match. They batted at 4.7 RPO and thats a lot in test cricket. In my opinion though the lack of two fast bowlers on Indian side allowed the Lankans to score quickly. What's your take on it?

RS: Well I don't quite agree, I think their sole quick - Pathan bowled real bad and hence has got the figures of 31 runs of 5 overs for no wicket and I think other Indian quicks, had they been picked would too have given away a lot of runs. Instead, the skipper shared the new ball and used it to very good effect, and in the process captured the wicket of his Lankan counterpart.

RF: Yes Saurav Ganguly deserves the wicket, he understood the wicket, bowled short of a length and didn't allow the batsmen to settle. Marvan Attapattu just couldn't gauge the bounce on that delivery that stayed low and caught him plumb in front. Here's the wicket:

RS: Yes, on the other hand Jayasuriya was stroking the ball quite well and the batting stats below confirm to the fact that the Matara marauder is in a dangerous mood here.

RF: So here's the Sri Lankan scorecard and Indian bowling figures at Stumps on Day 2. We hope the third day comes up with a bright sun and gives us a good day's cricket.

Click below:

 

[sachinisgod]

This thread is not WRITE PROTECTED!!!

 

[fardin]

lol sachin' will good batting i hope you team win's

 

[sachinisgod]

Day 3 Lunch, SL - 148 all out and 1/0

Harsha: Well, well! It wasn't such an eventless morning as we had thought when we saw the clouds hovering above.
Wilkins: Yeah! I thought the day was going to be rained off.
Harsha: Well it did rain, first runs and then wickets. 102 runs were scored in the session with the bulk of them coming in the first 10 overs of the day and 9 wickets fell.
Wilkins: I think, Jayasuriya batted beautifully. He showed why he is called the Matara Marauder. He smashed every bowler he came across to all parts of the ground.
Harsha: In the end though that aggro proved to be his undoing. Hitting Murali Kartik against the spin, lobbing up an easy catch on sweeper cover boundary.
Wilkins: Yes and after that Ganguly's men, esp. the spinners took over. Murali Kartik bowled an exceptional spell of 5 for 17. Harbhajan kept the other end extremely tight and Kumble too contributed with 1 wicket.
Harsha: All the same, we should give some credit to the exceptional catching around the bat. Ganguly sensed the kill and placed 4,5 or 6 fielders around the bat but all of them were exceptional catching 8 catches, in space of 20 overs.
Wilkins: In my view, Ganguly persisted too long with himself and Irfan Pathan first up. Had he thrown the ball to his spinners earlier then the Sri lankan score would have been still lesser.
Harsha: Yes but we cannot fault him for that. He used those six overs to scruff up the ball well so that the spinners could get a grip on it. And grip they did get , such a wonderful one that India is in an unassailable position here. Sri Lanka are trailing by 409 runs after following on.
Wilkinks: Yes I think its heartening to see India perform well overseas. But its heartbreaking to see the Sri Lankan middle order fail like that, esp after the wonderful start that Jayasuriya gave them. Here are the clippings from the match.

Jayasuriya was unbeatable and when he scored 16 runs off 4 consecutive Pathan deliveries, he came within striking distance of his half century which he duly completed. He can be seen acknowledging the applause here.

But hitting against the spin is not a healthy technique. He fell on 71 to Murali Kartik's flighted spinning delivery

Yuvraj gleefully accepted the offering.(Click)


The crowd gave a standing applause to their hero.

 

[sachinisgod]

Jayawardane looked bogged down and couldn't score for a number of deliveries. He couldn't score altogather in the end.

The catch by Dravid to dismiss him was an exceptional one(click)

Kumara Sangakara, guilty of giving more than 40 byes and now doing his duty by playing second fiddle to Jayasuriya couldn't continue from his start and fell to another sharply rising delivery from Kartik.

Meanwhile Tilakratne who came at Jayawardane's fall wasn't very quick on his feet. Though here he was safe.(click):

 

[sachinisgod]

Though his partner Samarweera didn't last too long. Harbhajan trapped him bat pad with the help of Laxman.(click)


Chandana came but couldn't play the tricks that he did with his bowling. Kartik gleefully consumed him with the help of Tendulkar.(click)


Dharmasena followed suit and suddenly Sri Lanka were 7 down.(click)


Tilakratne who was watching the rout from the other end, too fell in the same manner. Bhajji doing the damage.