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Tour Directory
India in Sri Lanka, 1997-98
Date-stamped : 01 Sep97 - 10:13
Monday 01, September 1997
First whitewash in one-day series: On a roll Lanka, roll over India
By Sa'adi Thawfeeq
World champions Sri Lanka completed their first white-wash of a
one-day international series against any cricketing nation when
they thrashed India by 3-0 in the recently concluded series.
Prior to doing so, the nearest they had come to achieving
similar success was beating England at home 2-0 in a two-match
series in 1992-93.
The series win was Sri Lanka's eighth in their history since
achieving Test status.
Sri Lanka's other one-day series victories were over Australia
(2-0, 2 NR) in 1982-83 and (2-1) in 1992-93, New Zealand (2-0,
1NR) in 1992-93, India (2-1) in 1993-94, Zimbabwe (2-1) in
1994-95 and Pakistan (2-1) in 1995-96. Sri Lanka's recent
one-day form substantiates one thing. That they are on a roll.
The cricketers will get a well-earned rest till October end, to
recharge their batteries before commencing battle once again.
The Jinnah trophy four-nation tournament in Pakistan to
celebrate the country's fiftieth year of independence, will
probably test Sri Lanka's one-day capabilities to the limit as
they will come up against some of the top one-day teams in the
game - host Pakistan, who should be at full strength with the
return of fast bowlers Waqar Younis and Mohammad Akram, and
leg-spinner Mushtaq Ahmed from the English county circuit, South
Africa and West Indies.
All the matches including the final, in this eight-day (November
1-8) tournament are scheduled to be played under lights at
Lahore, the venue of Sri Lanka's World Cup triumph over
Australia 18 months ago.
Sri Lanka's latest triumphs in the Asia Cup and, making a clean
sweep against India, has been largely due to their batting and
fielding, two areas which they have really outclassed every
country and, was a key to their success in winning the World
Cup. In Sanath Jayasuriya, they have an opening batsman whose
methods of destroying the opposition in the first 15 overs, has
confounded all teams.
Even in this age of the computer, where South Africa's
English-born coach Bob Woolmer uses such sophisticated equipment
to outmanoeuvre the opposition, a solution to counteract
Jayasuriya's dominance over the bowlers has not yet been found.
Let alone trying to curb Jayasuriya's stroke-play, no country
has even attempted to imitate Sri Lanka's methods of scoring the
maximum runs in the first 15 overs.
Pakistan tried it out briefly by opening the batting with Shahid
Afridi, who took the world record for the fastest one-day
century away from Jayasuriya in Singapore last year. But since
then Afridi has not held a permanent place as opener in the
side, being pushed down the order at times. In terms of success,
Jayasuriya has a more consistent record than Afridi.
Jayasuriya has not only proven his capabilities as an world
class opening batsman, but his left-arm spin has proved to be
equally effective so that, captain Arjuna Ranatunga lays so much
faith in his bowling to bring him on for the slog overs and more
so, to bowl the vital final over at the death, when the game is
balanced on a knife's edge.
Jayasuriya bowled the final over in the first one-dayer which
Sri Lanka scraped through by two runs, and in the final game,
when they won by nine runs.
Jayasuriya's value as an all-rounder to the team is immeasurable
and former New Zealand Test captain John Reid, who was the
International Cricket Council (ICC) match referee for the
series, had no contestants for the `Man of the Series' other
than him (Jayasuriya).
The failure of Romesh Kaluwitharana to be a successful partner
to Jayasuriya, has enabled Marvan Atapattu to fill in the slot
quite productively.
Atapattu began at the number three position, left vacant by the
departure of Asanka Gurusinha, and moved into the opener's slot
with Jayasuriya, in the Independence Cup game against New
Zealand at Hyderabad in May.
The pair successfully clicked together when only in their second
match, they added 148 runs for the first wicket in the first
final against Pakistan at Mohali, which was a record partnership
for Sri Lanka. The pair improved on these figures in the
recently concluded Asia Cup tournament, when they put on 171
against Bangladesh at the SSC grounds.
Part of Sri Lanka's success in the one-day series against India
could be attributed to this pair providing the side with
excellent starts like 91, 79, 85. Only in the replayed third
one-day did they fail scoring only three runs.
In circumstances like these, even though the opposition senses
it has got Jayasuriya early, they find their way to the Sri
Lanka middle-order barred by the broad bat of Aravinda de Silva.
Whenever Jayasuriya fails, De Silva is always there to deliver
the goods. The Sri Lankan vice-captain has proved many times
over that he is the man for the occasion. He revels under
pressure. The circumstances brings the best out of De Silva, as
was proved by his century in the final one-dayer at the SSC when
both Jayasuriya and Atapattu had gone for three apiece.
De Silva has done it in the World Cup semi-final against India
at Calcutta, the final against Australia at Lahore and several
times over at Sharjah in the Singer Akai Cup where his batting
made the difference between victory and defeat. In most
occasions it has become customary that Sri Lanka need not look
beyond numbers four or five to achieve a substantial total to
beat the opposition.
As a result, batsmen like skipper Arjuna Ranatunga, Roshan
Mahanama and Hashan Tillekeratne hardly get a batting turn.
Thus, it was a wise move on the part of the team management to
promote Mahanama to fill in the number three slot, although the
need for a change dawned on them only after he had figured in a
world record Test partnership of 576 for any wicket with
Jayasuriya. Mahanama has fully justified his promotion by
scoring three fifties in the four match series against India and
at the prime of his career, he looks to have gone back to a
position which he batted at school with great success.
Fielding has been another forte of Sri Lanka's success in the
overs-limit game. Credit for that should largely go to their
Australian-born physio Alex Kountouri, who is highly qualified
in treatment of soft tissue injuries.
It would be quite pertinent to mention here that since the
arrival of Kountouri in November 1995, Sri Lanka's cricketers
have suffered the least amount of injuries, barring of course
the knocks they get in the middle from which Kountouri has no
control over. It was his timely advise that saved fast bowlers
Chaminda Vaas and Nuwan Zoysa from aggravating back injuries and
seeking treatment early.
Sri Lanka's under strength has been its bowling. But that has
been compensated to a large extent by the fielding which at
times has bordered on the brilliance.
After fast bowlers Vaas and Sajeeva de Silva, skipper Ranatunga
has the option of a variety of trundlers to restrict the
opposition starting with off-spinner Muthiah Muralitharan, who
during the course of the series, joined Jayasuriya as the second
Sri Lankan bowler to take over a century of one-day wickets, the
fastish off-breaks of Kumara Dharmasena and the left-arm spin of
Jayasuriya. Further variety comes from the off-breaks of
Aravinda de Silva and Ruwan Kalpage and the leg-spin of Upul
Chandana.
From the figures produced, it could be noted that Sri Lanka
bowlers averaged nearly 5 1/2 runs an over in the series, which
would mean totals of around 275, which is quite expensive. As
long as the batsmen deliver the goods, such expansive totals
will not cause a problem, but it needs to be regulated, lest the
batsmen have an odd day off. For India, their bowlers was the
cause of their downfall. Combined with faulty fielding, they
conceded too many runs to Sri Lanka, and although their batsmen
played brilliantly at times, to try and grab back the
initiative, they failed narrowly in the first and last one-day
games.
Former captain Mohammad Azharuddin carried his Test form into
the one-dayers to top his country's batting with an average of
70.33 scoring a century and a fifty and accumulating almost the
same amount of runs as Sri Lanka's top batsman Aravinda de
Silva. On a tour where world batting records took a beating,
Azharuddin and Ajay Jadeja figured in an all-time 223-run fifth
wicket stand in the first one-day game played under lights to
come within two runs of beating Sri Lanka.
Two other Indian batsmen Saurav Ganguly and Robin Singh hit
their maiden one-day hundreds, but all their efforts were lost
by the bowlers.
One notable aspect during the one-day games was the
over-emphasis of the umpires to fall back on the television
umpire (or third umpire) for even blatant run out decisions,
which could have been given with the naked eye. Such actions
only leads to the diminishing of the standards of umpiring
because the umpire tends to relax in such situations, always
knowing he has someone to fall back on for decisions.
During the Asia Cup and Indian series it could easily be noted
how much television calls the shots on the running of the game.
How many times had Ranatunga and Sachin Tendulkar walked to the
middle to toss but were asked to wait until the TV cameras were
properly positioned to record the toss. Unless steps are taken
now to curb the threat of an overdose of commercialism to
cricket, the game would soon become a toy in the hands of TV
moguls.
Source :: Daily News (http://www.lanka.net)
Contributed by The Management (help@cricinfo.com)
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