Bengaluru: India were bowled out for 252 in their first inning by Sri Lanka at dinner break despite a brilliant innings by Shreyas Iyer (92 off 98) on the opening day of the second and final Test (pink ball game) at the Chinnaswamy Stadium, here on Saturday.
Resuming the second session at 93/4, runs came quickly for India as Rishabh Pant played some attacking shots. With seven boundaries, Pant raced to 39 off 26 balls before being cleaned up by Embuldeniya.
Ravindra Jadeja (4), who came to bat next didn’t last long as Embuldeniya scalped another wicket. R Ashwin then joined Shreyas Iyer at the crease and helped the hosts regain stability by forging a handy 35-run stand for the seventh wicket.
Just as it was looking like the Iyer-Ashwin partnership was taking India to a strong position, De Silva gave Sri Lanka the breakthrough, removing Ashwin for 13. However, Iyer continued to hammer boundaries at the other end and got to his fifty despite not getting much support from the next batters — Axar Patel (9), Mohammed Shami (5).
With India at 229-9, Iyer decided to go all-out and smashed a few towering sixes and moved closer to his century. He was dismissed for 92 eventually, missing his century by just eight runs.
Praveen Jayawickrama (3/81), Lasith Embuldeniya (3/94), Dhananjaya de Silva (2/32) and Suranga Lakmal (1/12) were the wicket-takers for Sri Lanka.
Earlier in the day, India won the toss and opted to bat first but the hosts got off to a poor start as Mayank Agarwal was run-out on 4. In the second over of the innings, there was an appeal for a leg-before against Agarwal that was turned down. The Indian batters thought they could sneak in a run and Mayank ran down the pitch.
However, there was some confusion from Rohit at the other end and the Sri Lankans took full advantage and ran Agarwal out. Hanuma Vihari then joined Rohit Sharma at the crease. The duo added 19 runs for the second wicket before Lasith Embuldeniya dismissed Rohit for 15.
On a flighted delivery, Rohit lunged into the forward defence and got an outside edge as Dhananjaya de Silva stayed low to take a good catch, leaving India in trouble at 29-2 after 9.3 overs.
However, Virat Kohli, who got loud cheers at his IPL home ground, and Vihari steadied the India innings. Vihari punished the short balls bowled by and stitched a handy 47 runs stand for the third wicket before Vihari fell to Jayawickrama on 31. Soon, Kohli was also trapped in front of the wicket on 23 by Dhananjaya de Silva before the Tea break.
Brief scores: India 252 all out in 59.1 overs (Shreyas Iyer 92, Rishabh Pant 39; Praveen Jayawickrama 3/81) vs Sri Lanka
(IANS)
