Sri Lanka clinched early honours in the three-nation T20 International series after they defeated India in the tournament opener on Tuesday night. The home team, who had opted to chase, pulled off the highest run-chase in T20Is at the R Premadasa Stadium in Colombo, to end a 7-match losing streak against India. Sri Lanka were given a target of 175, but the hosts polished off the chase quite comfortably, winning by 5 wickets with 9 balls to spare.
With the pitch playing a tad slow, 175 was a testing target. But Sri Lanka came out aggressive upfront and made the most of the hard new ball. Though the hosts lost opener Kusal Mendis in the second over, one-drop batsman Kusal Perera got stuck into the Indian bowling attack and powered his team to their best-ever powerplay score. By the time the fielding restrictions were eased after six overs, Sri Lanka had raced to 75-2 – with Perera scoring 39 from 17 deliveries.
Perera was extremely severe on Shardul Thakur, whom he hit for a hat-trick of fours and a six off four consecutive deliveries; he would add more misery on the bowler from Mumbai, scoring two more boundaries later in the same over. 27 runs – which included a No Ball – were added to the scoreboard in the third over of the innings, and the required run rate had dropped from 8.66 before the over to a manageable 7.58.
Though Kusal Perera was dismissed in the 13th over, outsmarted by Washington Sundar to be stumped, he had done the job for Sri Lanka; his 66 off 37 balls – his eight half-century in T20Is – left Sri Lanka needing 48 runs off the remaining 45 balls. Thisara Perera then polished off the chase, scoring an unbeaten 22 off 10 balls to take Sri Lanka past the finish line in the 19th over.
Earlier, India, put in to bat, got off to a poor start losing captain Rohit Sharma for a blob in the very first over. The experienced Suresh Raina perished in the second over with just 9 runs on the board. The innings was resurrected through a 95-run partnership between Shikhar Dhawan and Manish Pandey first, and then a 49-run partnership between Dhawan and Rishabh Pant.
Dhawan, who has been in magnificent form in recent times, was excellent yet again. On Tuesday, he made 90 – his career-best score in T20Is – improving upon the 80 he scored against New Zealand last year. Dhawan’s 90 included six boundaries and as many sixes.
Unfortunately for India, while Dhawan appeared to be enjoying his stay in the middle and was batting freely at one end, runs came in a trickle at the other end. By the time he was dismissed at the end of the 18th over, Dhawan had made 90 from 49 balls, while the batsmen at the other end had contributed 53 runs off 59 deliveries until that point in time.
India ended up scoring 174-5 – which equalled their highest total in T20Is in Sri Lanka, but they could have added another 20 runs to that total had Dhawan’s partners batted with a little more freedom.
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