It was a stubborn performance from Sri Lanka in the third and the final Test in Delhi as they have pulled off a draw and thus have saved their pride. Team India thus has won the Test series by a 1-0 margin and have increased their unbeaten Test series run to 9 series wins, which also a record by any Test nation as only had only won the same number of consecutive Test series.
Sri Lanka started the day at 31 for 3 with their veteran batsmen Angelo Mathews dismissed came out to bat just before the end of play on Day 4. The rest of the batsmen had made sure that they bat throughout the day to reduce the chances of victory for Team India. They did just that as the Sri Lankan lower order stepped up to the challenge.
Dhananjaya de Silva scored a resistant hundred but got retired out as he was suffering from camps after his marathon innings. As he departed from the ground, India sniffed a chance of victory but Niroshan Dickwella (44*) and Roshen Silva (74*) helped Sri Lanka survive. Despite the fact that Dickwell tried his best to gave away his wicket a lot of time, he was, again and again, got saved by his fortune.
For India, Ravindra Jadeja picked up three wickets in the 2nd innings. Sri Lanka’s stubborn batting meant the Indian bowlers only managed to pick up two Sri Lankan wickets Day 5.
This Delhi Test match was again filled with controversies as the smog in winter turned out to be a spoilsport for almost the entire length of the Test match with several Sri Lankan players finding it difficult to continue playing. It came down to a situation when the Sri Lankan support staff were about to take the field but finally, the issue was sorted.
India will certainly be happy to win teh Test series but certainly not with how the Test match panned out in Delhi. The “smog controversy” turned out to be a serious issue which needs to be considered by BCCI in upcoming matches.
India from here or move on to their next assignment to South Africa where they will be playing a full-fledged series. This series was certainly a dress rehearsal for the big upcoming series.
Brief Scores
India 536 for 7 dec (Kohli 243, Vijay 155, Sandakan 4-167) and 246 for 5 dec (Dhawan 67) drew with Sri Lanka 373 (Chandimal 164, Mathews 111, Ashwin 3-90, Ishant 3-98) and 299 for 5 (de Silva 119 retired hurt, Roshen 74*, Jadeja 3-81)
