After Thilan's colourless crawl to an unbeaten century in Sri Lanka's first innings, it was a relief to watch Sehwag's attacking batting under pressure in the final test
After Thilan's colourless crawl to an unbeaten century in Sri Lanka's first innings, it was a relief to watch Sehwag's attacking batting under pressure in the final test
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| Thilan Samaraweera during his unbeaten hundred at the P Sara Oval, Colombo yesterday. pic/afp |
Virender Sehwag's unfussy school of batting technique has charisma of its own. Matched against that of Thilan Samaraweera, it explains the difference between someone who knows class and style and how to wear a dress suit while the other dons a hand-me-down sarong bought from a jumble sale.
Sehwag works out in his own mind what he wants to do and how to execute the batting strategy needed. This is full on attack and the fielding side has no hope in curbing or combating this type of strokeplay.
Why, even setting fields becomes a joke as the bowler can serve up what is a quality delivery only to find it crashing into the boundary for another four.
This is why comparing Samaraweera's 12th Test century as a colourless performance compared to Viru's flamboyance,u00a0 was one of those anchor efforts designed to keep India in the field for as long as possible in the third game of this series.
This was against a tightly structured spin bowling attack of the left-arm orthodox spinner Pragyan Ojha and Amit Mishra, with Ojha leading the effort to take wickets and curb the Sri Lankanu00a0 batsmen. He admitted how learning to bowl without Harbhajan Singh has been a challenge.
Samaraweera's innings is the sort of frustrating batting that another purveyor of this type, former England opener Chris Tavar ufffd once employed so effectively against the Australians. It lacked finesse and was time consuming without purpose. All it did was extend the Sri Lanka innings into the fifth session of the game against a soft Indian bowling attack and a first innings total of 425 with Samaraweera's six hours of crease occupation a tiresome exercise to watch.
Already with a 1-0 lead, they are either hoping India will implode twice and so earn a facile 2-0 victory, or looking for a second draw. The latter option has become more unlikely after Sri Lanka Cricket administrators went in television and downgraded their own bowling attack from the draw at the Sinhalese Sports Club, suggesting it is poor.
All this doesn't say too much about their hopes for this game as they rely on Lasith Malinga to blast holes in the Indian defence with rocket-propelled yorkers.u00a0u00a0u00a0u00a0u00a0
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Last week, however, Sehwag reached 99 when he was stumped when attempting a six off Suraj Randiv. He charged the off-spinner and paid the penalty. This time he has been more circumspect.
Two years ago in Galle, when he made the so-called mystery man Ajantha Mendis, despite his six wickets for 117, appear so out of his depth at Test level as to be embarrassing. He was Viru, the Excalibur stylist as he put the bowling to the sword in a fascinating display of quality batsmanship that plundered the Sri Lanka bowling.
Here at P Sara Oval, he reorganized his batting plan, and after India's early hiccup losing a couple of wickets, he settled down with Sachin Tendulkar, to create certain pressure on Sri Lanka for the first time in this three-match series. Only bad light ended his bid to score his 21st Test century, leaving him three runs short but an impressive strike-rate of 111.49.
His one error was a missed caught and bowled chance by Angelo Mathews shortly after the Rahul Dravid dismissal and Ojha admitted that luck was with India on this occasion.
u00a0"I think it is definitely very vital for when you realise it is Virender Sehwag, it is not easy to accept," Ojha added. "We have seen in the past the way he scores his runs... How fast he can score."
