Indians dig themselves into a hole

However, when stumps were drawn today, the one’s who were smiling were Chaminda Vaas, Mutthiah Muralitharan and Mahela Jayawardene.

The only disappointment for Lankan coach Tom Moody was the fact that had it not been for the rain they would have got more opportunity to show the amount of effort and planning after the last ODI loss to India at Baroda on November 12. ‘‘ We’d prepared very hard for this, and it was a shame that the weather won in the end. But we’re looking forward to Delhi,’’ he said.

Moody’s tone today was much different from the one heard during the ODI series — where the Indians hit them so hard in Round One that it was tough to recover. India’s 350 batting first in the first ODI at Nagpur meant Sri Lankan captain Marvan Atapattu at the end of the series said, ‘‘they never allowed us to play well.’’ At Chennai the Sri Lankans got the upper hand and the blame lies with the Indian team for letting the advantage slip.

Chappell, too, hinted at that when he was asked about the fall of eight wickets for 70 runs. ‘‘ I thought we made it look a bit harder than it really was,’’ he said.

And figures quite prove that the Indian middle order — Dravid, Tendulkar, Laxman, Ganguly — played 298 balls between them to score an aggregate of 64 runs. The slowest being Tendulkar who took 21 overs (126 balls) to score his 22 runs.

If Sehwag lacked patience for his 28 balls 36 yesterday, today it the Indian middle order dug in so deep that they ended in a hole. The Indian batsmen seemed confused about the Test approach. While some have taken their flannels too seriously, others are still in their blues.

But the Sri Lankan batsmen seemed to have got the right balance in their batting approach. As compared to the 1.2 runs (an over) scored by the Indian middle-order, the Sri Lankans got the runs at an average of around four per over. On a wicket that kept low and also spin with the old ball, being ultra-defensive was not the way out.

Dravid was out defending one outside the off to be caught behind, Tendulkar was lbw trying to defend Muralitharan while Pathan just probed to the same bowler to be caught and bowled.

Incidentally Ganguly was the only batsman out while trying to score. His uppish drive caught at point off Fernando.

The one bright spot for India was Dhoni’s 54-ball 30. Playing his first Test there wasn’t that forced check on stroke or even that mindless method of fastidiously sticking to the natural game. He hit Murali inside out, he slashed Fernando but always followed it with a dead defence.

At least there is one thing the coach can read from the Chennai match: Dhoni as a Test ’keeper hasn’t disappointed.