Scorecard:
India: 163 for 5 (20 overs)
(Raina 85 off 49 balls, Gambhir 41 off 32 balls, Dhoni 23* off 19 balls, Malinga 2 for 25, Thushara 2 for 41)
Sri Lanka: 167 for 5 (20 overs)
(Matthews 46 off 37 balls, Sangkarra 46 off 33 balls, Kapugedera 37* off 16 balls, Dilshan 33 off 26 balls, Vinay Kumar 2 for 30)
India was on a mission today. First Karthik and Gambhir put together 30 off 4.2 overs, and then Gambhir was joined by Raina to add 66 in 6.5 overs. Then however they slowed down even though they had lost just 2 wickets. Dhoni added just 48 runs in 6.1 overs with Raina! Even the last 16 balls added 19 runs only. Well, still to their credit India did manage a decent total. However, Sri Lanka to their credit stopped India from getting 180-200 which seemed more likely. So the target for Sri Lanka is just 144 to qualify for the SemiFinal. Would they get it?
Bang! one wicket went down with just 4 on board - Jayawardene is back. Rookie Vinay Kumar is now going to bowl the second over. Bang! another wicket goes and Sri Lanka are 6 for 2 in 1.5 overs. Are they headed back?
Not yet! Nehra is smashed for 3 fours in the next overs. Dhoni blinks, and Harbhajan is on. Dilshan is on fire. He again smashes 2 more fours and Sri Lanka race to 32 for 2 off 4 overs. Dhoni calls back Vinay Kumar again. Slowly Sri Lanka creep back into the game cautiously. By the time India start claiming wickets again Sri Lanka have gotten near to the 144 target to qualify for the Semi Finals. They seem to be in no mood to try and win this game.
But no, in the last 2 overs they got into a frenzy just as they ensured that India didn’t get into the Semifinals they launched one last assault to get the target. And they got it on the last all!
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