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Saturday, April 2, 2011

Jayawardene's ton powers Sri Lanka to 274


Teams:

India: Sachin Tendulkar, Virender Sehwag, Gautam Gambhir, Yuvraj Singh, Virat Kohli, Suresh Raina, MS Dhoni (c/wk), R Ashwin, Harbhajan Singh, Zaheer Khan, Munaf Patel

Sri Lanka: Tillakaratne Dilshan, Upul Tharanga, Kumar Sangakkara (c/wk), Mahela Jaywardene, Thilan Samaraweera, Chamara Kapugedara, Thisara Perera, Lasith Malinga, Suraj Randiv, Muttiah Muralitharan, Nuwan Kulasekara


Mumbai: Quick wickets - Thilan Samaraweera (21) and Chamara Kapugedera (1) - gave India an opening to restrict Sri Lanka before 250 in the World Cup final at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai on Saturday.

First Yuvraj trapped Samaraweera right in front, while Zaheer Khan deceived Kapugedera with a slower delivery.

But the experienced Mahela Jayawardene kept the scoreboard ticking after Sri Lanka lost the wicket of their skipper Kumar Sangakkara (48).

Sangakkara was caught behind the wickets of the bowling of Yuvraj Singh.

Jayawardene scored a well-composed fifty and always kept Sri Lanka to post a modest total.

Earlier, Sangakkara and Mahela Jayawardene took the Sri Lankan innings forward after Harbhajan Singh gave India their second breakthrough.

The wily off-spinner clean bowled Tillakaratne Dilshan after the Sri Lankan opener threatened to take the attack to the opposition.

Sangakkara and Jayawardene, both brilliant players of spin, played cautiously early on in their innings but opened their shoulders once they got their eye in.

Earlier, Zaheer got reward for the perfect line and length as the Indian bowling spearhead got the wicket of Sri Lankan opener Upul Tharanga (2), who was caught brilliantly in the slips by a diving Virender Sehwag.

The left-armer bowled back-to-back maiden overs to the Lankan openers that created the pressure and ultimately the wicket fell.

Lankan skipper Sangakkara and hard-hitting Dilshan tried to cut loose after Zaheer Khan provided India the first breakthrough. But Dilshan's wicket put the brakes on Lankan scoring.

S Sreesanth, who replaced Ashish Nehra in the Indian playing eleven, supported Zaheer well initially but lost his line completely in the second spell. 

Dilshan tried to break free on some occasions but was pegged back by the superb Indian fielding. Yuvraj Singh at backward point and Suresh Raina in the covers fielded like tigers to cut the angles and prevent Sri Lanka from scoring.

Again Indian captain MS Dhoni pulled a rabbit out of his hat as he picked S Sreesanth in place of Ashish Nehra in the playing eleven.

Sri Lanka got a bigger jolt among the two sides as their key all-rounder Angelo Mathews was ruled out due to a hamstring injury. It changed their team composition altogether, which had four changes in the playing XI. 

Chamara Kapugedara came in place of Chamara Silva, Suraj Randiv for Ajantha Mendis, Nuwan Kulasekara for Rangana Herath and Thissara Perera for Angelo Mathews.

Both teams, except a hiccup or two, have had a smooth journey upto the final, with India going through sterner tests against Australia and Pakistan as compared to Sri Lanka, who had smooth sailing against England and New Zealand in the last eight and last four respectively. 

Though they were beaten by Pakistan in the round robin-format, it just gave them the necessary fillip to perform in the rest of the tournament.

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