T20 WC brand ambassador Yuvraj backs Rohit & Virat in squad
Karthik started the last T20 World Cup in Australia as India’s designated keeper before losing his spot ahead of the team’s semifinal defeat to England.
In the second T20I match of the three-match T20 series between India and Sri Lanka, Sri Lanka have managed to score 142/9 after 20 overs, giving India a target of 143 runs to win. Indian skipper Virat Kohli had won the toss and elected to bowl first. On the other hand, Sri Lankan skipper Lasith Malinga also admitted that they would have elected to bowl first as well, had they won the toss. Both the teams were playing unchanged XIs from the Guwahati T20I.
Virat’s decision to bowl first has worked well for the team in the first half as they managed to restrict the opposition to just 142/9 on a wicket which is known to be a high-scoring one. Notably, when India had last played a T20I at this venue, they had managed to score a massive 260 runs batting first and won the match by a big margin of 88 runs.
Although Sri Lanka got off to a decent start in the first few overs, regular breakthroughs from Indian bowlers never let the Sri Lankan batting settle. Consequently, the touring part could never take the attack to the Indian team except for Kusal Perera who scored 34 of 28 before falling prey to Kuldeep Yadav.
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Avishka Fernando also looked good for his 22 off 16 balls but fell to Washington Sundar. Virat’s team selection also worked wonders in the first half as all the bowling options used by him were among the wickets.
Shardul Thakur was the pick of the bowler for the Indian team with excellent figures of 3 wickets for 23 runs. All his wickets came in the penultimate over of the Sri Lankan innings. Navdeep Saini’s 2 for 18 runs was also a big positive for the Indian team as the opposition batsmen were in all sorts of trouble adjusting to his extra bit of pace.
Kuldeep Yadav also picked up two wickets while Washington Sundar and Jasprit Bumrah picked up a wicket each.
Skipper Kohli would be very happy with the target they have been set as India would be confident of chasing this down with relative ease.
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