Four days to register a win and take a 2-0 series lead, but it wasn’t as easy as the reading went. India had to fight hard to hand over Sri Lanka an innings defeat as the Sri Lankan batsmen showed gumption after a poor batting display in the first innings. Two centurions – Dimuth Karunaratne and Kusal Mendis batted and fought for long much to the admiration and applause of the opposition just for the kind of fight they showed they were capable of. For Kohli and co. it was about keeping the focus on all the time with continued pressure on all ocassions.
“You expect teams playing Test cricket to come out and play like that. You have to give credit to their batsmen as well, to play like that on a pitch like that. It was high quality batting and you expect that to happen at the Test level. We spoke as a team that we have to embrace this because all sessions that we play are not going to go our way. We just had to be realistic and our plan was to keep working hard, keep hitting the areas, keep doing the skills you know best and just wait for something to happen with our discipline and then we can put some more pressure again.”
Kohli acknowledged that it was a commendable effort by his bowlers to get those 20 wickets on a pitch that was getting slower. “The pitch was getting slower and that was the reason we took the new ball straight away. As soon as the new ball was taken then we thought the batsmen are going to look to score now. The ball might come better on to the bat and then they might play more shots. R Ashwin was spot on yesterday; it was getting difficult at the later stage of the day. Today again we spoke about getting those couple of chances and then we could get 4-5 in a session which ended up happening in the second session.
“The bowlers did an outstanding job today of pulling things back and keeping it simple. And that’s what happens in Test cricket, sessions go away from you and you have to pull it back to win a Test match. I think it was very good for us from a team’s point of view. We were up against a challenge in the last four sessions that we played yesterday and today. We managed to turn things around and you always feel good as a team when you come back from a difficult situation and win the Test match.”
Kohli reserved some special praise for Ravindra Jadeja who picked up seven wickets in total, five in the second innings when things weren’t quite going India’s way. It was Jadeja’s 9th five-wicket haul and also added another accolade of being the fastest left-armer to pick 150 wickets. Not to forget, his late cameo of 70 in the first innings with the bat. “Guys who have both abilities are very rare to find. That's where we think they're very precious, especially in the longer format because they provide you with great balance,” Kohli said. “He can give you a very quick 60-70 anywhere at any stage of the game and it can really turn the game. I remember his innings at Lord's and in Dharamsala against Australia. Those are very important innings and the 90 against England in Mohali. He has come under pressure and performed. He has the ability, he believes in it and he's worked extra hard in the last 10-12 months on his batting too. He's bowled so much that the other discipline was left behind, but now he's catching up in that as well. It's only going to do good to him. If he doesn't bowl well on a particular day, he can score runs. Once he scores runs, then he gets confidence with the ball also. He's always in the game, his fielding as well. I would say he's a very valuable cricketer for us.”
Not to forget the batting exploits of CheteshwarPujara and AjinkyaRahane who put up a double century stand giving the team a perfect platform to set a huge score. Rahane coming back to form and getting to a valuable century were good signs, but Pujara continuing his white ball exploits with such consistency impressed the captain.
“I say this regularly. Pujara and Ajinkya are our two best Test batsmen, especially in the middle order. They've been doing so well consistently. Pujara, I would give him more credit because he only plays one format for India. And to be able to have that hunger and passion day in day out, working hard on his game, coming out and having those consistent performances takes a lot of mental strength. And he's a guy with a lot of mental strength. He obviously has the game. He knows how to score runs, which is the most important thing. He has evolved massively as a batter since then. All of us have, but Pujara's game has gone to another level. If you see last season, continuing now, he's got about 1500 runs which is outstanding. All credit goes to how hard he works on the game, and how he thinks about his game as well. He scored runs in all conditions that we play, I think that for us is most important.”
A 2-0 reading makes for good reading and at Kandy, there are chances of making it 3-0 and heading towards a whitewash. For Kohli though, the focus was not on the number but on the task ahead.
“It is obviously nice to win this series again. We won this last time also, in 2015. Yes, we do have that chance of a whitewash, but honestly speaking, we are not looking at Test matches or Test cricket now as home and away anymore. We are just looking at Test matches as Test matches and we want to win anywhere that we play. If we can believe enough in our abilities then we are not really bothered about where we are playing.
“That kind of energy I can sense in the team, and the team believes that as well. We are creating a habit of winning, that I think can be carried on in future as well. So yes, from the numbers point of view and from stats point of view, these things look great, but for us as a team, it's all about achieving those small little goals everytime we go out to play a Test match. For us, this is priority. Test cricket is the most important thing for us. In the dressing room we feel really proud of each other’s efforts, that we're really putting in those consistent, convincing performances, and winning Test matches more often than getting the other results. We really feel good as a team that we're able to win consistently right now, but we realise that it's very important to keep carrying on the same way as well.”
