Raina and Pathan clinch victory out of jaws of defeat.

India vs Srilanka 3rd ODI at Colombo.

First of all this Match had a very good crowd attendance far better than 1st and 2nd ODI played at hamabantota. Srilanka won the toss and decided to bat first. Indian bowling looked very dangerous during the start of Srilankan innings.At one stage Srilanka were 20/3.Pathan and Zaheer were bowling a very nice line & length.After that Kumar Sangakara and Mahela jaywardene took over the charge and by playing the intial overs carefully they slowly started to turn on the heat by playing their strokes freely.Jaywardene got out but Sangakara continued and he scored a labourious well deserved century. Sangakara also got struck on his right hand's little finger when ashok dinda bowled a bouncer and he is now ruled out of cricket for 4-6 weeks which is a big blow for srilankan team.But after Sangakara got out Mathews and Mendis had a good partnership and Srilanka made 286. Now India had to chase 287 and chasing this total would mean India will be the 1st ever team to chase the highest total at R.Premadasa, colombo.

Indian reply started with Sehwag getting caught at cover by playing a uppish drive. Gambhir continued his form of the last match and Kohli was also going great with his elegant cover drives and pulls. Kohli got out and after that came a big surprise.MS Dhoni took a good decision and came up the order.MS Dhoni rotated the strike very well with Gambhir without taking any risk. Then came the batting powerplay in the 36th over and Malinga came back into attack. Malinga bowled 2 yorkers as he started the over.1st ball came inswinging towards dhoni and he got clean bowled. Rohit Sharma came in and the 2nd ball of the over hit his boot on the full and he was LBW.Rohit scored a Duck and his bad form continues in this series.Srilankans were Pumped up and India were 180/4.Gambhir scored his 11th ODI century but he soon got Run Out.Then came Suresh Raina and Irfan Pathan . They played the batting powerplay carefully which ended in the 40th Over. Now the run-rate was going up but these two batsmen were not able to stroke the ball to the boundary. After the 42nd Over some luck favoured Raina and he started getting boundaries.Pathan also came into the party and he stroked some boundaries. Then Raina hit a SIX off Malinga which bought up his half century and India came near to victory.Match went into the last over and 6 runs were required for India to win the match. Irfan Pathan hit the winning runs and India clinched victory out of jaws of defeat.

Now India has a 2-1 lead in the Series but Srilanka will fight back hard.India needs to play well in all departments of the game in the next match and they can seal the series.

Preview: India vs Srilanka 3rd ODI,Colombo,2012

Writing a post for the first time in this blog which is dedicated to Indian Cricket.
India vs Srilanka these two teams have played so many matches in the recent past that it is very difficult to say which team will play like a champion on a particular match day. Talking about this micromax cup 2012 which started with India showing a powerful batting performance with the likes of sehwag and kohli firing all cylinders and srilanka dropping catches of some main players of indian team.In the end srilanka lost despite a wonderful batting performance from kumar sangakara.
Coming to the 2nd ODI- India showed a miserable batting performance.Gambhir played a fighting knock of 65 but didnot get any support from other batsmen.Srilanka chased a small total of 139 with ease.Dilshan and tharanga scored 50's.
Now the series is level at 1-1 and India will be looking for a fight back.In any 5 match series the 3rd ODI is of very much Importance because the Team winning this game will have a upper hand on winning the series. India needs to Pile up runs and for that the first four top order batsmen need to give a better batting performance and thier ground fielding + catching needs to improve  where as Srilanka have a very good bowling line up and thier bowlers are looking in very good form.
Colombo is the venue for this ODI and India have Played many ODI's on this venue.Gambhir and Sehwag are in good touch that is a good sign for Indian Team But India needs to get quick breakthrough during Intial Part of Srilankan Innings because Indian Bowlers have always been pretty expensive during the latter part of the innings.

We have a very intresting battle on our hands and this will be a series deciding match with both teams applying their full strength.