Its tomorrow
:k:
Time 9.00 A.M Local (3.30 GMT)
Venue Delhi
On a cold Delhi morning, MS Dhoni joined the Indian team, won the toss, and chose to field in the dead rubber, also the teams’ last international match of the year. Sachin Tendulkar was rested, which means Dinesh Karthik kept his place in the XI. Medium-pacer Sudeep Tyagi, replacing Ishant Sharma, got his ODI debut.
The Feroz Shah Kotla track, in focus for its low and slow nature of late, sported patches of grass interspersed with bald patches. It was difficult to predict how the pitch would behave.
India were looking to end a run of losses in dead rubbers. Going into the match, India had won seven out of eight bilateral ODI series. In three of those series, the scheduled last match could not be played, and India lost four other dead rubbers - two of them against Sri Lanka.
Sri Lanka, looking to end a disappointing tour on a happy note, got their usual share of rotten news before the toss. It was Mahela Jayawardene’s turn to get injured, but Chamara Kapuegedera still didn’t get another game. Instead offspinning allrounder Muthumudalige Pushpakumara was handed a debut. The good news for Sri Lanka was, their leading bowler on the tour, Chanaka Welegedara, came back from injury.
India 1 Virender Sehwag, 2 Gautam Gambhir, 3 MS Dhoni (capt/wk), 4 Virat Kohli, 5 Dinesh Karthik, 6 Suresh Raina, 7 Ravindra Jadeja, 8 Pragyan Ojha, 9 Zaheer Khan, 10 Sudeep Tyagi, 11 Ashish Nehra.
Sri Lanka 1 Upul Tharanga, 2 Tillakaratne Dilshan, 3 Kumar Sangakkara (capt/wk), 4 Sanath Jayasuriya, 5 Thilan Samaraweera, 6 Thilina Kandamby, 7 Muthumudalige Pushpakumara, 8 Thissara Perera, 9 Suraj *****v, 10 Chanaka Welegedara, 11 Suranga