Adelaide, Feb 14: A game that featured veterans from either side (Jayawardene’s 100th match as captain, Tendulkar’s 106th ODI against SL), ended in the balance after 100 overs of swinging fortunes. Gautam Gambhir was claimed in the 90s once more, a dismissal that changed the course of the match that seemed to be going India’s way. But skipper MS Dhoni’s end-of-game heroics left India fans celebrating despite the tied result. Take a look at how the thriller proved the two sides were perfectly matched.
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Irfan Pathan had last played an ODI outside India in February 2009, also against Sri Lanka. Incidentally, his last ODI appearance outside the subcontinent was in March 2008 in Australia.
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MS Dhoni was playing his 200th ODI. He became the fifth wicketkeeper to do so after Mark Boucher (294), Adam Gilchrist (282), Kumar Sangakkara (270) and Moin Khan (211). Dhoni’s tally includes 197 matches for India and three matches for Asia XI.
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Mahela Jayawardene was playing his 100th match as captain. His tally includes 97 matches for Sri Lanka and three for Asia XI. Jayawardene became the third Sri Lankan to have played 100 matches as captain after Arjuna Ranatunga (193) and Sanath Jayasuriya (118).
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This match was the 106th international match for Sachin Tendulkar against Sri Lanka (25 Tests + 81 ODIs). Tendulkar now holds the record for playing the most international matches against a particular country. The previous record was of 105 matches held by Sri Lanka’s Sanath Jayasuriya against Pakistan.
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Upul Tharanga made his 13th duck in ODIs – his fifth against India. He now equals the duck-tally of Romesh Kaluwitharana, Mahela Jayawardene and Chaminda Vaas against India. Only Sanath Jayasuriya (7) has aggregated more ducks against India.
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Tillakaratne Dilshan became the seventh Sri Lankan batsman to complete 6,000 runs in ODIs.
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Virat Kohli, on 14, completed 3,000 runs in ODIs. He became the 17th Indian batsman to do so.
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Kohli became the quickest Indian to reach the 3000-run landmark (75 innings). The previous record was held by Navjot Sidhu, who took 79 innings to do so.
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Kohli is the fourth quickest in ODIs to reach the 3,000-run mark after Viv Richards (69 innings), Gordon Greenidge (72) and Gary Kirsten (72).
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Gautam Gambhir (91) became the fifth Indian batsman to score two back-to-back nineties (he had made 92 against Australia two days ago, also at Adelaide). Others who have had similar outings for India are: Krish Srikkanth (in 1982), Sourav Ganguly (in 2004), Sachin Tendulkar (in 2007) and Rohit Sharma (in 2011).
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Dinesh Chandimal (81) scored his third consecutive 50-plus score against India. He had made 111 at Harare on June 5, 2010 and 64 at Perth on February 8, 2012.
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The match provided the 26th instance of a tie in ODIs – the sixth for India, fourth for Sri Lanka and the first between these two teams.
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MS Dhoni has now joined Richie Richardson (WI), Steve Waugh (Aus) and Shaun Pollock (SA) in featuring in three ties as captain.
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This was the first tied match in which both teams played the same number of overs (50) and lost the same number of wickets (nine) apart from scoring the same number of runs (236). In addition, both teams also hit same number of fours (15) and sixes (two).
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MS Dhoni won his 16th Man-of-the-Match award – his sixth against Sri Lanka.
