Sri Lanka v India, 1st Test, Colombo, 23-27 July

Murali is ranked no.1 test bowler for close to 2.5 years now. Thats astonishing.

Spin guru Jenner points out chink in Mendis' armour

SG wrote:Spin guru Jenner points out chink in Mendis' armour

He's right but Mendis is only a newbie and it is very unfair to compare him to veterans. Besides why do you have to have a stock ball all the time? Having variety is more versatile.

cant wait for this series. cricinfo is showing scattered thunderstorms for the next 5 days though.

Why is it so hard to schedule a series when it's not ****** monsoon?

Anniyan wrote:

SG wrote:Spin guru Jenner points out chink in Mendis' armour

He's right but Mendis is only a newbie and it is very unfair to compare him to veterans. Besides why do you have to have a stock ball all the time? Having variety is more versatile.

Every spinner has to have a stock ball. You change too much, you actually become predictable. Atleast that's probably what Jenner's saying.

Anyone with a dodgy link?

www.dodgy.com

doremi wrote:www.dodgy.com

You deserve a punch for that.

Last time India played a test at SSC they suffered their worst ever loss against SL, a loss by an innings and 77 runs.

Another amazing stat about SSC, Mahela has scored over 2000 runs here, most for any batsman at a single ground.

Since India's last test series against SL in SL in '01, SL has played 14 series at home and won 11 of them, with 1 draw against NZ and 1 loss each against Aus and Pak.

Here we go,

From cricinfo,

Rain Bad news. Overnight heavy rain which carried on in the morning as well and it's still drizzling out there.

So at the moment it is just a drizzle and probably the ground staff will need 90 minutes to clear the covers. Having said that, chances of play starting before lunch looks bleak.

Weather update,

11:35 am: "Few covers are coming off, mostly in one half of the outfield," says Jamie. "The pitch is uncovered, plenty of covers still on adjacent to it though. Now more covers are being removed and the umpires have walked onto the field and are now circling the outfield. But Jamie, the killjoy, adds, "rain is in the air.

i'll be surprised if we get any result in this match. though july-sep is the driest season in sri lanka its not entirely dry for colombo. shift the matches to the east of the country

I'd really like to see this game but fat chance of that happening with the weather and the fact that I won't be by a TV or a computer for the next two days. Look's like I'll be Youtubbing Mendis 5fer Test vs India!

2:39 pm: "The sun is out. The ground staff are removing covers from the field. A few players coming out - Prasad and his coffin make their way to one of the practice pitches,". "Jayawardene and one of the coaching staff stand at midwicket. Some Sri Lankan players join them. Kumble also walks out. Word is that play may start at 3.30pm, but that's yet to be announced. That would leave about 42 overs of play.

When's the toss?

waqar : the pitch looks like its going to be difficult to bat on in the 5th innings

further changes by the icc?

SL has won the toss and they'll be batting first.

Here are the 2 teams,

Sri Lanka 1 Michael Vandort, 2 Malinda Warnapura, 3 Kumar Sangakkara, 4 Mahela Jayawardene (capt), 5 Thilan Samaraweera, 6 Tillakaratne Dilshan, 7 Prasanna Jayawardene (wk), 8 Chaminda Vaas, 9 Nuwan Kulasekera, 10 Muttiah Muralitharan, 11 Ajantha Mendis.

India 1 Gautam Gambhir, 2 Virender Sehwag, 3 Rahul Dravid, 4 Sachin Tendulkar, 5 Sourav Ganguly, 6 VVS Laxman, 7 Dinesh Karthik (wk), 8 Anil Kumble, 9 Harbhajan Singh, 10 Zaheer Khan, 11 Ishant Sharma.

If we can make Sanga and Mahela to come in early at the crease, things may get a bit tricky for SL.

Looks like this will be a low scoring game considering the cracks in the pitch.

SL win toss and will bat first.

Pitch seems to be tailormade for spinners and it'll be very very difficult to bat in the 4th innings.