Sri Lanka win battle for pride

Strangely, for most parts of this fifth one-day international, it looked as if it was India who were playing for pride rather than their beaten opponents in the series.

Strangely, for most parts of this fifth one-day international, it looked as if it was India who were playing for pride rather than their beaten opponents in the series. Mahendra Singh Dhoni and his boys might strike a happy pose with gold medals hanging around their necks, but to walk away from Lankan shores with such an embarrassing final blow 8212; they went down by 112 runs chasing a revised target of 216 in 44 overs 8212; somewhat takes the sheen away from their first ever one-day series win in these parts.

The fact that it was an inconsequential match seemed to show 8212; Dhoni reverted back to five bowlers in the XI and capped that decision by underutilising Munaf Patel when Thilan Thushara and Jehan Mubarak were slaughtering the attack. And then, the batsmen walked in and out of the pavilion, managing just 103 in 26.3 overs between them.

Mendis strikes back

India8217;s lack of intensity also put Ajantha Mendis back among the wickets. Yuvraj Singh8217;s nightmare run with the bat continued as he was cleaned up by the first delivery Mendis sent down, marking the left-hander8217;s fifth straight failure in the series. To that, the Lankan spinner added the scalps of Irfan Pathan, Zaheer Khan and Pragyan Ojha to suggest that perhaps the Indians hadn8217;t really figured him out after all.

Dhoni8217;s rare failure wasn8217;t a blot big enough to deny him the Man of the Series award, but even after finishing on the right side of a 3-2 scoreline, there were a few points to ponder.

Gambhir failed to carry his form from the Test series and failed for the fourth straight outing. Rohit Sharma flopped once again, while Suresh Raina8217;s over-confident pull shot to a delivery that wasn8217;t short enough went straight up in the air. Once the rain came down at 70/3 in 14.2 overs, India8217;s hopes of pulling off a victory looked even bleaker.

Lankan stutter

Earlier, even the hosts didn8217;t get much right with their batting after Mahela Jayawardene won his first toss of the series and elected to bat first on a slow wicket.

Sanath Jayasuriya departed early after top-edging Zaheer to the third-man region. Then, Warnapura and Udawatte crawled through the first power-play to see off the disciplined new-ball attack of Munaf Patel and Zaheer. The two Lankan batsmen added 77 runs in their 75-minute association for the second-wicket before Pathan struck twice in four balls to send them both back to the pavilion.

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Jayawardene and Kapugedera, who benefited from the third umpire8217;s decision on a caught-and-bowled chance against Ojha, went back to soft dismissals trying to target the cover area against the left-arm spinner. Ojha returned with outstanding figures of 10-4-28-2 on his comeback outing.

Strong finish

Thilan Thushara came to Sri Lanka8217;s rescue for the fourth time in four matches 8212; his maiden half-century providing the hosts with stability in the middle overs to take Sri Lanka to what turned out to be a match-winning 227.

RP Singh, playing his first match of this tour, was treated with utmost contempt in all his three spells. Udawatte and Warnapura accounted for most of the runs early on before Mubarak carted all his three boundaries in that one over from the seamer.

In terms of this series, the failures didn8217;t seem to have rankled much as one by one, team members hopped into Dhoni8217;s new car. But the series might just have brought up some interesting questions that could determine which direction the team take.