NEWS
MATCH REPORTS
DIARY
OTHER SPORTS
SLIDE SHOW
PEOPLE
ARCHIVES

Rain halts play in Colombo

Lanka 293/4, Ranatunga 67, Jayawardene 128

Overnight rain added a bit of a rider to proceedings on day three. The pitch would, in the conditions, have sweated under the covers and that, added to high humidity levels, meant the bowlers would find conditions to their liking.

Venkatesh Prasad and Anil Kumble responded with very good spells in the first hour. Prasad ran in a lot better than he was doing in his first spell yesterday, and got the ball to seam around, causing problems for both the overnight not outs.

But the real eye-opener was Kumble. He bowled a touch slower than he usually does, tossed the ball right up, made it bounce and turn and had Jayawardene, a very fluent, natural strokeplayer, in all kinds of trouble.

The real surprise came when, on more than one occasion, he produced a delivery I don't recall seeing more than a couple of times in the last four years -- the googly, superbly disguised, landing on a perfect line just outside off and curling in, causing problems for batsmen who tend to look for Kumble deliveries to come on straight.

The leg spinner was the one who always looked likely to break through, but it was Prasad who actually did the job, producing one on a full length on off cutting in to middle, trapping Hathurasinghe in front of middle and getting the decision from umpire Russell Tiffin to have Sri Lanka at 129/3.

Jayawardene and Aravinda D'Silva -- two batsmen playing with identical styles, stroking fluently whenever the bowlers varied even a fraction in line or length and defending well to the good deliveries, then took Lanka forward, looking increasingly ominous as they began building their partnership.

However, Harbhajan Singh's introduction in place of Kumble produced the breakthrough. The first ball, pitched leg stump, was swept fine for four. The second was pitched off, and Aravinda went for an encore with disastrous results -- getting his foot too far across to a ball of fuller length, he ended up hitting over the ball and watching it turn sharply in to hit leg, a light touch of his glove helping the ball onto the stumps.

Mahela Jayawardene, meanwhile, had slowed down his pace of run-making in the face of some good bowling -- and, perhaps, his own consciousness of the approaching three figure mark. The Indians in the field promptly slowed things down even further, the over rate dropping drastically as the go-slow came into force.

Lots of discussions between bowlers and fielders after every delivery, lots of team discussions between overs, Ashish Nehra running the length of the pitch, almost up to the batsman, on his follow through then walking slowly back -- the idea appeared to be to make Jayawardene wait endlessly for each ball.

Nehra, the 19-year-old left arm seamer making his debut, had some problems with no balls (three in his first over) as he stretched for pace. This forced him to come around the wicket, and it did look as though he doesn't practise that too often in the nets -- the bowler tends to fall away at the moment of delivery, thus spraying the ball around a touch. To his credit, he quickly throttled back, went to three quarter pace and concentrated on just putting the ball up on a wicket to wicket line.

Harbhajan Singh too looked impressive in the morning session, making the ball bounce and turn to a considerable extent. Ranatunga countered by covering up and letting them through -- interestingly, the offie did not consistently employ the tactic of going round the wicket to the left-hander, the classic ploy of an offspinner faced by a southpaw.

Sri Lanka went in to lunch at 184/4, with Jayawardene batting on a composed 89, Ranatunga keeping him laboured company on 1. 63 runs were scored off 26 overs in the session for the loss of two wickets, which makes it a good one for the fielding side.

Post lunch play

The session between lunch and tea saw India lose its grip on the game.

The highlight of the first hour after lunch was Mahela Jayawardene's painful progress towards a century filled in equal measure with flowing boundaries and chancy let-offs.

The boundaries were not much in evidence this afternoon, as the batsman felt the pressure of some good bowling and tight fielding, Azharuddin doing well to keep him constantly under pressure.

Cat-like, Jayawardene used up a few more of his nine lives in course of the afternoon. In the second over after lunch, Prasad pitched the perfect line around off, drew the batsman forward and found his edge. The ball flew to the right of second slip, Laxman dived and got the ball in his palm but ended up putting it out to grass.

Three runs later, with the batsman on 96, Harbhajan, who was getting a lot of bite and turn on this track, produced the drifter. Jayawardene, playing for the turn, found it going straight through to take the edge. Saurav Ganguly at a very fine first slip dived to his right, got both hands around the ball, but the fall jolted it out of his hands and gave the batsman another crack at the landmark.

Ranatunga was looking pressurised at the other end -- had either of those catches stuck, India would have been in a position to really turn the screws on the batting side. The let offs, thus, proved crucial to the fielding side's chances of taking a good grip on the game.

Jayawardene finally got his century in the best possible way -- down the track to a flighted one from Harbhajan Singh, lifting him easily over the long on boundary for his second six, to move on to 105 off 210 balls. The 169 dot balls he faced are a testimony to his patience, just as his 17 boundaries and two sixes -- which makes 80 runs off boundary hits alone) an indicator of his ability to seize on the loose balls and put them away in style.

Once Jayawardene was past a landmark he had sweated to earn (this being his second Test century, to add to five fifties in 7 Tests for an impressive average above 57), he settled down to the long haul -- a nice indicator to his temperament. Ranatunga meanwhile eased the pressure on himself in trademark fashion -- chatting up the bowler and keeper, strolling singles with bat tucked under his arm, smiling those cherubic smiles, employing the nudge and flick and checked sweep to get the bowlers off their line.

Typical Ranatunga, that -- his career stats show that he has been bowled 16 times, LBW 16 times, caught by the keeper 23 times, and caught in other positions (a lot of the times in slips, by the men under the helmet, and at short cover and short midwicket) 59 times. Which indicates he is at his most vulnerable when he is being made to play around off and off the front foot with a close cordon in place -- and the canny Lankan captain's first objective when he gets to the crease is to use his little nudges and cheeky grins to get the close fielders out of range. The Indians obliged.

Though the new ball became due in this session, and the overcast sky and muggy conditions seemed to indicate the wisdom of taking it, the Indians persisted for a while with the old one. The new ball was finally taken by Prasad in the 89th over -- the penultimate over before tea -- with, however, just a single slip in place as the Indians retained the defensive field placing.

At tea, Lanka had got to 274/4 off 90 overs, having added 90 runs off 27 overs during the session for no further loss.

The bonus points situation at this point was India 5, Sri Lanka 3. India stood to gain another point if, within the next ten overs, it could take out at least one more wicket. Sri Lanka needed 26 more runs off the same number of overs to gain another batting point.

And the way things looked, once the 100 overs mark was reached and there were no further bonus points to play for, competitive interest in the game would end.

Post tea session

Events in this session made you wonder if either of the two teams in this contest were even halfway keen on this game. Are they playing under some kind of duress, you think?

India didn't appear particularly keen to get that extra bonus point, starting with a defensive field despite the fact that they were operating with a ball only two overs old -- I mean, how the dickens do you get batsmen out with just one slip in place and the rest guarding the fences?

Ranatunga and Jayawardene, in optimum conditions, cruised smoothly along with deft placements and good running. With the score on 293/4 in 95 overs (which meant Lanka needed six more in five overs), Ranatunga collapsed to the ground, clutching the back of his leg.

Everybody hung around while the Lankan captain got a good ten minutes of on-field treatment. At the end of which, he asked for a runner. And everybody hung around a bit more while Russel Arnold got all padded up and went out there to do the needful on behalf of his captain.

By then, clouds had begun scudding across the ground, and the light was fading. Ashish Nehra had the ball in his hands -- and you would assume, wouldn't you, that the thinking would be to try and use the conditions, and Ranatunga's hampered footwork, to try and knock back a wicket?

No way. Nehra pitched one halfway down the track. Then followed up with another bouncer. And immediately, the umpires offered the light -- which was the obvious intention behind those successive bouncers anyway -- the batsmen accepted it, and everyone walked off the field, smiling.

End of story, as the rain came down shortly thereafter and caused play to be called off for the day.

There are 4.4 overs left for India to take that one further wicket and get the last possible bonus point on offer here. And the same amount of time for Sri Lanka to get seven runs and move to four points for the match. The next landmark is 318 -- the score Lanka needs to make to ensure that it does not have to follow on.

After which, indications are that both teams will go through the motions for the remainder of the two days. And then India will come back home, to hope that Lanka in its final league game against Pakistan beginning March 4 doesn't head them on the points tally and to nose into the final of the ATC.

Scoreboard