Tillakaratne Dilshan guided Sri Lanka to 8 wickets victory against India

Just couple of days after scoring an empathic win against the world champions Australia, India fell against Sri Lanka. The Islanders registered a comprehensive win in the 5th ODI of the series and made their hopes alive to stay in the series. Opener Tillakaratne Dilshan guided his team to 8 wickets victory in the company of captain Mahela Jayawardene. After the fall of two quick wickets Sri Lanka was looking in trouble, but T Dilshan (62, 59b, 7x4, 6x1) and M Jayawardene (36, 35b, 4x1) took their team to victory. For his brilliant batting T Dilshan was adjudged the man of the match. Due to rain the 50 overs match was shortened to 29 overs each and later to 21 overs. Besides the unimpressive bowling of team India, the rain also played a major role in the victory of Sri Lanka.

Earlier Sri Lanka won the toss and elected to field first in the rain-hit match. Indian openers Sachin Tendulkar and Virender Sehwag (14, 18b, 4x2) added 45 runs, before the latter caught on the boundary by M Muralitharan in the bowling of N Kulasekara. Sachin Tendulkar (32, 30b, 4x4) also feel at short interval in 8.2 overs when the team's total was 49 runs. Gautam Gambhir (35, 33b, 4x3), Rohit Sharma (70 not out, 64b, 4x6,6x1), M S Dhoni (31, 26b, 4x3), Yuvraj Singh (6, 3b) and Robin Utthapa (0, 0 b) took the team's total to 195 runs for the loss of 5 wickets in 29 overs.

Team India set a good target of 196 runs before Sri Lanka, but the rain again spoiled the game and the target was revised to 154 runs in 21 overs. Now the match turned into a Twenty20 game and chance of winning the game became 50-50 for India. Sri Lankan veteran opener Sanath Jayasuriya was back into his old charisma and made his intentions clear by targeting S Sreesanth. The islanders raced to 42 runs in just 3 overs and Sanath Jayasuriya was looking well set to take the game away from Indians. But, Ishant Sharma dismissed Sanath Jayasuriya (27, 13b, 4x2, 6x2) in the 4th over behind the wicket by M S Dhoni. Kumara Sangakara was the next batsman to out,he gave an easy catch to Ishant Sharma in the bowling of Harbhajan Singh.

Indian bowlers who did very well in last match against Australia in Malbourne could not repeat the same magic in at Manuka Oval in Canberra. Amongst the Indian bowlers, S Sreesanth was badly punished by the Sri Lankan batsmen. The pacer went for 48 runs in 3 overs that took the match in Sri Lanka's favour. Ishant Sharma and Irfan Pathan also remained expansive. The Delhi seamer who remained the hero in last match returned with the figure of 27 for 1 in 4 overs, while Pathan gave away 29 runs in 4 overs. respectively.

Now all participating team has won match each, while two matches had been washed away by rain. The next round matches are very important for the three teams to enter into the finals. Of course, India has lost this match, but the India batsmen and bowlers are looking in good form and we can hope for India’s berth in the finals.