Confident Lankans face Indians today

Dilanka MANNAKKARA

Sri Lanka will be coming out all guns blazing in Colombo after a crushing victory against a strong Indian side in the second ODI held at Sooriyawewa on Tuesday. The Lankan bowlers, led by Thisara Perera and Angelo Mathews ripped through the strong Indian run machine and openers Tilakarathne Dilshan and Upul Tharanga smashed the Indian bowlers to all corners to clinch a grand victory.

However once again the fielding of the Lankan lions wasn’t top class as there were some misfields and the usually reliable Angelo Mathews dropped a sitter of a catch of India skipper Dhoni at slip. Fortunately Mathews was able to dismiss Dhoni within minutes after the dropped catch but the Lankans cannot afford to drop catches and be careless in fielding in Colombo as the Indian batting juggernaut can capitalize on the smallest of errors.

Upul Tharanga who hasn’t being amongst the best of form stroked a delightful fifty in the last game. Tharanga who has an abysmal record against India with just solitary fifty in 17 games was determined to guide Sri Lanka towards victory and he succeeded in doing so. The Lankans will be hoping that Tharanga will provide Dilshan the much needed support for a solid opening stand today.

Dinesh Chandimal is indeed Sri Lanka’s best young batsman by a distance after the selectors trying out perennial and proven failures like Chamara Kapugedara and Chandimal has been quite consistent in his relatively short international career. However Chandimal hasn’t performed up to his potential at all especially in Sri Lanka. He averages a poor 17 in 10 games played in Sri Lanka while has a dismal record in the Sub continent in 17 games with just 245 runs under his belt including one fifty. Chandimal needs to play his natural aggressive game and to rotate the strike more often instead of getting bogged down at the crease consuming a lot of dot balls. Chandimal loves to dominate bowlers and we would love to see this young talent using his feet against the spinners as he did in England in 2011 where he smashed Greame Swann in the ODIs.

One wonders as to why Suraj Randiv does not play ODIs which he is obviously more suited with his wily off spinners, superb fielding and handy batting ability. For some odd reason the selectors do not seem to prefer Randiv in ODIs and his replacement Sachithra Senanayke is been waiting among the wings in the Sri Lankan squad.

Sachithra would be a useful addition to the final 11 if he plays as other than his off spinners, he can bat as well and is an athletic fielder. Sri Lanka’s preferred spinner Rangana Herath has been economical and miserly but hasn’t been amongst the wickets and it will be interesting to see if Sachitra gets a game today.

Sri Lanka might also be tempted to go with two spinners depending on the wicket and slow ball specialist Isuru Udana who had a forgetful debut might be replaced by Senanayke.