India will take on Sri Lanka in the second Test of the three-match series at the P Sara Oval in Colombo on Thursday. This will be Kumar Sangakkara’s farewell Test and the susceptible visitors would look to spoil the party. Having lost the 1st Test by 63 runs at Galle, Virat Kohli-led India would want to bounce back strongly in the remaining two Tests. India were outstanding for the first two and half days of the first test and looked like winning the game quite convincingly until they came up against an inspired pair in Dinesh Chandimal, who scored a brilliant counterattacking 162, albeit, should’ve been given out when he was on 5 and 10, and 37 year old veteran spinner, Rangana Herath who bamboozled the Indian batsmen during their pursuit of the target of 176.
There are a number of concerns that Team Director Ravi Shastri and Captain Virat Kohli will have to address. While Murali Vijay will return to the team for this Test, Shikhar Dhawan, who made a century in the first test, has been ruled out of the rest of the series due to a hairline fracture he sustained while fielding during the first test. Rohit Sharma, who continues to disappoint despite receiving unwavering support from his captain and coach, is under massive pressure to keep his place in the side. Stuart Binny, who has been roped in as a replacement for Dhawan in the squad, might get a look in. Harbhajan Singh, who has been pretty average in the two Tests he has played since his much hyped comeback, might be dropped in order to bring in the Karnataka allrounder who will also strengthen India’s batting. Virat Kohli’s approach nearly yielded the result India wanted, only for poor umpiring while Sri Lanka were batting and India’s poor batting in the second innings, to cost them the game.
As for the others, the pace attack looks more or less settled with Ishant Sharma and Varun Aaron bowling at a good pace in the first Test and taking a few important wickets. Ravichandran Ashwin has been the pick of the bowlers in this tour. Ashwin picked up 10 wickets in the first Test match against Sri Lanka and is one of the players Sri Lanka will be wary of. Amit Mishra, who made a comeback to test cricket after four years, had a respectable outing at Galle where he picked up five wickets in two innings.
“We should have been a bit more aggressive in our batting and should have been more positive. There is nothing lacking in team morale and it’s the same before this match. We will go harder at them and put in double the effort in this Test. Whatever mistakes we made in the first Test, we will work and improve on them because we were playing Test cricket after a lengthy gap,” Mishra told reporters ahead of the second Test match against Sri Lanka.
On the other hand, Sri Lanka will be looking to bid adieu to one of the greatest cricketers of his generation in a victorious manner. Not many players enjoy as much of a upward curve in batting form as Sangakkara has had in the final few years of his career. In 2014, at the age of 36, he scored the more runs than he has ever made in a calendar year. This year, he scored his 11th double century, one short of Don Bradman’s world record of 12 double centuries.
The venue for this historic test match, carrying a lot of significance for both the teams, P Sara Oval, is conventionally the most seamer-friendly of all the pitches in Sri Lanka. We should not be too surprised if the captain winning the toss opts to bowl first, especially if there is a green tinge on the pitch. Furthermore, showers are forecast on all five days of the Test, but the rate at which tests are ending in the recent past, the weather, one assumes, shouldn’t be a massive hindrance.
Expected Team line ups –
India – 1 M Vijay, 2 KL Rahul, 3 Rohit Sharma, 4 Virat Kohli (captain), 5 Ajinkya Rahane, 6 Wriddhiman Saha (wk), 7 R Ashwin, 8 Stuart Binny, 9 Ishant Sharma, 10 Amit Mishra, 11 Varun Aaron
Sri Lanka – 1 Dimuth Karunaratne, 2 Kaushal Silva, 3 Lahiru Thirimanne, 4 Kumar Sangakkara, 5 Angelo Mathews (captain), 6 Jehan Mubarak, 7 Dinesh Chandimal (wk), 8 Dhammika Prasad, 9 Rangana Herath, 10 Tharindu Kaushal, 11 Nuwan Pradeep
