Related Links : Sri Lanka in India 2009/10 | Scorecard of Day 2 | India Vs Sri Lanka, 1st Test – Live Scorecard and Commentary
Sri Lanka have raced away to 155 for 1 in just 34 overs at Tea on Day 2 of the first Test at Ahmedabad. Tillakaratne Dilshan has continued to unsettle each of the Indian bowler to move onto 88 from 106 balls with the help of 9 fours. He has the solid company of Skipper Kumar Sangakkara (23* from 49 balls with 3 fours) at the other end.
Resuming the post lunch session at 37 for 0, Sri Lanka went smoothly without any damage until MS Dhoni came up with a blinder of a catch in the 17th over. It was Ishant Sharma giving the much needed breakthrough for India when the left handed Paranavitana was squared up on the backfoot to edge an away swinger. It looked certain that it would be an outside edge falling short of first slip but the keeper Dhoni dived across and pulled off a sensational one handed catch to his wrong side. Paranavitana contributed 35 (from 55 balls with 6 fours) in an opening stand of 74.
Dilshan continued to blaze around whenever he could and there was hardly any stopping. Even Harbhajan Singh and Zaheer Khan found it hard to stop the flow of runs. Amit Mishra had a rough time in keeping up with consistency in his lengths and was taken for 40 in his 7 overs. But he has been the only bowler from both sides to get something out of the pitch being a wrist spinner. Dilshan has smartly unsettled him with his attacking shots while Sangakkara has shown good technique to cover up for the turning leg breaks.
The Lankans now trail behind India by 271 runs. The post lunch session was very productive with 118 runs coming from 26 overs at the loss of just the one wicket. India will have to keep bowling a lot of dot balls in the final session to create some sort of pressure on the Lankans. There are still 38 overs left in the day’s play.