It was a winning start for India’s new captain-coach duo in Pallekele, with Suryakumar Yadav leading from the front with a blistering 22-ball fifty in India’s 43-run win in the first T20I. India’s new T20I era under Suryakumar Yadav began on a winning note, even if it was jittery at various points in their defence of a big score.
Suryakumar Yadav during India’s first innings took matters in his own hands and made the middle overs count, which meant that Matheesha Pathirana’s four-wicket assault in the death overs was safely accounted for. And then there was also this small matter of fielding lapses from Sri Lanka, in both catching and ground fielding, which allowed India to breath easy every time they were under the pump.
Pitch and Toss
The Pallekele stadium pitch tends to favour batters, particularly in the evening when the floodlights are on, as the ball travels more easily off the bat. However, as the match progresses, bowlers who can vary their pace become increasingly effective. Teams batting first typically aim for around 170 runs, considered a competitive total at this venue. Despite this, the presence of dew in evening matches often leads teams to prefer chasing, as it can make bowling more challenging later in the game.
In the LPL, the average first-innings total in Pallekele across five matches was 185. During those games, spinners fared much better, registering an economy of 7.64, as compared to fast bowlers, who went for 10.58 runs per over. There is a forecast for rain during the daytime but not in the evening. So the match should be largely unaffected.
The weather is expected to be pleasant but sultry. Once a venue of high scores – and also one of the highest ever in T20Is – Pallekele hasn’t hosted too many T20Is in recent years. However, it would be a surprise if the Saturday night contest wouldn’t be another high-scoring encounter.
Sri Lanka skipper Charith Asalanka won the toss and chose to bowl . India skipper Suryakumar Yadav batting first decided to play with World cup stars like Axar Patel, Rishabh Pant and Hardik Pandya returning to the playing XI.
A fast start for India as Gill and Jaiswal lay down a marker in the Powerplay
India, the reigning T20 World Cup champions, began this new cycle with an opener who watched the World Cup from the bench and another who didn’t make the squad. But such is the depth of Indian cricket that Jaiswal and Gill barely broke a sweat while adding 74 runs in the first six overs, India’s highest PowerPlay score this year and the highest ever against Sri Lanka.
Things in fact had started looking up for India as early as the first ball of the innings, which Jaiswal dispatched for a boundary with a pick-up pull shot. The left-hander was adept against pace and spin, playing the off breaks from Maheesh Theekshana with just as much ease. Gill, it must be said, matched his partner shot for shot, and even pulled a six off his front foot before a slower ball accounted for him. But the job was done.
On match eve, Shubman Gill had acknowledged the need to improve his T20I batting template. On Saturday, he walked the talk, cutting and pulling anything fractionally short to put pressure on the bowlers during the powerplay. Yashaswi Jaiswal was equally aggressive, as India’s new opening partnership turned into a healthy contest of one-upmanship.
Jaiswal’s intent upset Sri Lanka and their plans to introduce spin early. He welcomed Maheesh Theekshana with a clean hit for six over long-off and followed it with a ferocious slog sweep for four. In all, India scored 11 fours and three sixes in the powerplay during a 74-run first-wicket stand before Dilshan Madushanka had Gill miscuing a lofted shot to mid-on for a 16-ball 34.
The Suryakumar Yadav show lits up the middle overs
Suryakumar Yadav’s batting in his first innings as full-time T20I captain was always going to be seen as a template for his team, and the 33-year-old played exactly like himself, sweeping, shuffling and peppering the area behind square on the legside with pick-up shots en route to his 22-ball fifty, his second-fastest in the format. Suryakumar Yadav hit 8 fours and 2 sixes, one of the maximums coming over long leg against the menacing Pathirana.
The fast bowler had his revenge in his next over with a fast, full LBW-eliciting delivery but what the Indian captain’s 26-ball 58 had done was not allow India to linger over Yashaswi’s dismissal first ball after the PowerPlay, the young opener finding Wanindu Hasaranga’s well-disguised googly too hot to handle. The leg spinner was the pick of the bowlers in his phase of play, bowling his quota of four overs for only 28 runs in a high-scoring innings.
Gill’s wicket was followed by Jaiswal’s off the very next ball for a 21-ball 40, Wanindu Hasaranga having him stumped off a ripping googly. But Suryakumar Yadav was quickly into his element, moving inside the line to play the pick-up flick for six from just his fourth ball. He offered a chance on 15 when he top-edged a Madushanka bouncer in the eighth over, only for Asitha Fernando to drop the catch at fine leg. It would prove costly.
Suryakumar Yadav peppered different arcs on the legside boundary with his plethora of sweeps, punishing Hasaranga and the ambidextrous Kamindu Mendis to raise a half-century stand for the third wicket; Rishabh Pant’s contribution to it a mere 11 runs. Suryakumar Yadav soon brought up his half-century off just 22 balls, his second-fastest in T20Is, but fell in an attempt to take on Matheesha Pathirana, who was held back till the 12th over to close out the innings.
Pathirana leads Sri Lanka fightback in death overs
Come the final lap, India wanted Rishabh Pant to get going, the batter hitherto having struggled during his run-a-ball 20. He cut loose with a 6 and a 4 against Asitha Fernando and looked set for some more but Pathirana’s exploits at the other end impeded him and India’s run-scoring in the slog overs.
Hardik Pandya, having walked out ahead of Riyan Parag and Rinku Singh, couldn’t quite keep out a 151 km/hr yorker from Pathirana, something that came India’s way plenty in the remainder of the innings, one of which pinned Parag in front and another off-pace variety that bowled Pant. Axar Patel hit a six off the final ball to take India to 213, a score that they would have taken after losing the toss. But on the other side, they did look good for 240, something that opposition captain Asalanka admitted after the match.
It took Pant a dropped catch – by Asitha at deep square leg – and 15 balls to find his first boundary. His next one, a helicopter shot over midwicket in the 16th over broke a 14-ball boundary-drought following Suryakumar’s dismissal. In fact, Pant barely managed to get out of second gear for much of his innings. Prior to his first six, he scratched his way 20 off 23. He made 29 off the next 10, eventually falling 49 while attempting to takedown Pathirana for a third boundary in a row.
Pathirana stuck to a simple mantra of bowling straight and fast, relying on a slight tail in to clean bowl Hardik and Pant, while dismissing Riyan Parag in the same way he did Suryakumar – lbw to a low-arm slinger as they missed full balls. Pathirana finished with 4 for 40 as India finished with 213 after being 135 for 2 after 12 overs.
The Pathum Nissanka – Kusal Mendis turbocharge in the Powerplay raise Sri Lanka’s hopes
Sri Lanka might not have been as quick in the first six overs but they ensured that India didn’t get an early breakthrough. Nissanka in particular took the attack to the visitors, whistling off the chase with back-to-back boundaries in the opening over and then later laying into Mohammed Siraj with two sixes in the space of three balls. Axar Patel and Ravi Bishnoi combined to bowl half the PowerPlay overs but didn’t quite find the purchase that Hasaranga did earlier in the match.
Sri Lanka kickstarted their chase in the third over as both batters got stuck into Axar’s drifters into the stumps. Nissanka cranked it up a notch when he hit Mohammed Siraj for two sixes in the fourth over, ramping him first over third man and then clubbing him over deep midwicket. Sri Lanka raised their fifty off 31 balls.
Hardik was welcomed with a bludgeon through point, Ravi Bishnoi swept and reverse-swept with disdain as he kept firing deliveries down leg. When Mendis got inside the line to mercilessly flick Arshdeep Singh into the grass banks in the ninth over, India were nervy. But off the next ball, the batter’s attempt to repeat the shot had him holing out to deep midwicket.
Pathum Nissanka too good for India in the middle overs
Sri Lanka bossed the middle overs despite losing three wickets, two of them in the final over of this phase. With India laying both their frontline spin cards on the table in the PowerPlay itself, the visitors had little to fall back upon in the middle overs. Pandya started with a short-wide delivery that was dispatched for four and came in for some punishment throughout his spell of 4-0-41-0. It was Arshdeep Singh who eventually broke the 84-run opening stand by deceiving Kusal Mendis with a knuckle ball.
The ordeal though didn’t end there for India who were at the receiving end of another solid partnership, with Nissanka and Mendis adding a quick-fire 46 runs. At 140/1 after 14 overs, the hosts looked in absolute control of the match but a double strike from Axar Patel in the 15th over saw the back of top-scorer Nissanka and Kusal Perera and provided a major inflection point in the innings.
Sri Lanka’s counter-punch forced mistakes from India, Nissanka raising his half-century off 34 balls with an overthrow that gave him five runs. Nissanka’s exhibited his full range soon after, reverse-sweeping Axar, pouncing on anything dragged down and even improvising to get inside the line of length balls and swatting them over the ropes. But at 140 for 1, Nissanka chopped on attempting to cut. The slow walk back signaled a job unfinished.
Riyan Parag justifies selection with bowling effectively to guide India to 43 runs victory.
Sri Lanka unraveled from 140/1 to 149/4 and then to 170 all out, losing 9 wickets for 30 runs in the space of 31 balls. Charith Asalanka was bowled by a Bishnoi googly, Dasun Shanaka was run out without facing a ball, Kamindu Mendis was bowled by Parag and Hasaranga was caught according to the plan at mid-on. It was only a matter of time for India now. Parag added the wickets of Theekshana and Madushanka, finishing with figures of 3 for 5 and helping India bowl Sri Lanka out without four balls to spare.
Siraj and Arshdeep had two overs apiece. With four overs left and India needing to defend 56, it seemed obvious Suryakumar would turn to his two frontline pacers. Instead he threw the ball to Parag, who had been picked ahead of Shivam Dube and Washington Sundar. And unlike Bishnoi and Axar, Parag slowed it down and gave it a rip.
After India got lucky with Dasun Shanaka’s wicket courtesy a run out made possible by Siraj’s athleticism at short third, Parag bowled Kamindu and gave away only five runs at a crunch moment. Then with Sri Lanka in a freewill and all but out needing 44 off six, he was given a second over, when he picked up Theekshana and Madushanka off successive deliveries to seal victory.
Presentations and Road Ahead
Charith Asalanka the loosing skipper said : We were not up to the mark in the powerplay, but in the latter part, we came back pretty strong. Some stage, we thought they might get to 240, we did well. Little disappointed with the way the middle-order batted, we could have done better. (On the balance of his side) It’s an experiment, this is the way we should go in the future.
Suryakumar Yadav the winning skipper and Player of the Match said : They were playing a good brand of cricket from ball one. They were keeping the tempo, credit goes to them. We know how the wicket plays in the night. We were fortunate that there was no dew. The way we played in the World Cup, that reminded us that the game was still too far. (Left-right combination to be persisted?) Whatever works for the team, we’ll take the call.
India take a 1-0 lead in the three-match series with a pretty big win. It was set-up by their top-four batters who powered them to a total of 213. The World Champions were the firm favourites at the halfway stage but the Sri Lankan batters did put up a fight. Chasing a big total, Nissanka got off the blocks quickly but Mendis overtook him after the powerplay as the Sri Lankan openers scored at close to 10 RPO. Arshdeep broke the 84-run opening stand in the ninth over as he dismissed Mendis with a knuckle ball.
That didn’t hamper Nissanka as he notched up a fifty and kept finding boundaries. He was involved in another half-century partnership with Perera and Sri Lanka needed 74 runs off the last six overs with nine wickets in hand. That’s when Axar put a spoke in the hosts’ wheel with a double-wicket over. Sri Lanka couldn’t recover from that as they lost wickets in a heap (lost their last nine wickets for 30 runs).
A 43-run win to kickoff the new era under Suryakumar Yadav & Gambhir. The Indian bowlers were put under some pressure by the Lankan top-order but they came back strongly in latter part of the innings. Hasaranga was economical and Pathirana picked four wickets but the hosts were very sloppy in the field.