Rohit Sharma said it best at the end. India needed a game like the one Sri Lanka gave them under the belt. That they won and booked a place to contest for silverware would appear to be a bonus. In the context of what’s coming next and the absence of an elaborate run-in of games, the Asia Cup was always going to be the one truly competitive tournament to test out the team’s readiness for the marquee World Cup to follow.
And it takes all kinds of pitches and scenarios to gauge a team’s standing. India faced high quality swing and seam in their opener against Pakistan. The Super Fours encounter against Babar Azam’s team was a test in maximising returns on relatively flatter conditions. Fifteen hours later, India were back at the Premadasa Stadium for a very different challenge viz. spin.
The Indian captain admitted he wanted to play on surfaces like this. And he may just get some during the World Cup campaign, perhaps in Chennai (versus Australia), in Delhi (versus Afghanistan) and in Lucknow (versus England). So it was imperative to prepare for such a challenge.
Counter-intuitive though it may seem, India haven’t necessarily done well on such pitches in the recent past, especially against an accurate left-arm orthodox spinner in the opposition ranks. In Mirpur late last year, they were stung by a Shakib Al Hasan five-fer before Mehidy Hasan pulled off a heist in the low-scorer. In Chennai, Ashton Agar and Adam Zampa stifled India’s batters to give the visitors a series-clinching win. More recently, India slipped to defeat in Bridgetown with Gudakesh Motie tying them up in knots.
Tuesday afternoon in Colombo appeared to be a continuation of the batting comforts India had enjoyed over the two-day encounter against Pakistan until Dunith Wellalage was thrown the ball. With his first delivery, he extracted bite and cleaned up Shubman Gill. Virat Kohli struggled to come to terms with the pace of the wicket in a 12-ball stay and chipped a simple catch to mid-wicket while trying to bunt a ball to the legside. Soon after completing a half-century, Rohit was castled by a skidder that kept low.
And just like that, India’s perceived insecurities against left-arm orthodox were laid bare by the 20-year-old’s five-fer. Before this game and since the start of 2021, Kohli had been dismissed seven times for an average of 14.87. Suryakumar Yadav had fallen six times while Ishan Kishan, who may seem a match-up option against the bowling type, was prized out five times by the likes of Bjorn Fortuin (x2), Motie, Keshav Maharaj and Akeal Hosein. The only batter to have not been dismissed by left-arm orthodox spin before today — KL Rahul — was also the only one to get some hold of conditions during his 44-ball stay for 39.
India, facing the tougher of the batting conditions, could have folded under 200 but for a late 26-run contribution from Axar Patel. When India expect spinning conditions, they will have Axar swap in for Shardul Thakur and become an important cog in the wheel at No.8, where the team seeks batting proficiency. It is what has gotten Axar the nod in the squad over the likes of Ravichandran Ashwin and Washington Sundar despite Rohit ceding that he’d have liked an offspinner in his team for added variety.
But where Axar has had an excellent year with the bat, he has been underbowled across formats and the rustiness showed when he went for 29 runs from five overs on the very pitch that Wellalage, Asalanka, Kuldeep and Jadeja were making merry on. Along with the concerns playing left-arm spin, Axar’s rhythm with the ball — he’s bowled his full quota of 10 overs only twice in 15 games since the start of 2022 — will need immediate attention.
Ultimately though, whichever of Axar or Shardul plays, India will imagine him to operate in a partnership with the other all-rounder – Hardik Pandya – and save one another from unfavorable match-ups. Favorably for India, Axar’s no-show with the ball was covered up admirably by a fiery Hardik spell just when the game appeared to be slipping out of their hands, this time courtesy Wellalage with the bat.
That they overcame a very short turnaround and a plucky opponent in front of a partisan and vociferous crowd in conditions very different to the ones they’d played on so far will hold India in good stead. The weighty lessons picked up along the way will now need to be studied and worked on.