Virat Kohli has led India to yet another successful chase as India complete their Sri Lanka tour unbeaten, whitewashing the hosts across all three formats.
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India made it 9 out of 9 on the tour of the island, as Sri Lanka were no match to Virat Kohli and his Men in Blue.
After suffering a 3-0 Test and 5-0 ODI whitewash, Sri Lankan fans headed into the R Premadasa Stadium in Colombo for the only T20 International, as they hoped for a better fortune in the shortest format of the game. However, that was not to happen.
It was India who won the toss and elected to bowl first, as Dickwella and Tharanga began the innings for the hosts.
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Skipper Tharanga could never get settled, before he was bamboozled by an in-swinger from Bhuvneshwar Kumar that clipped his pads before rattling the stumps.
Nevertheless, after a complacent ODI debut in the last One-Dayer, Dilshan Munaweera turned his fortunes around, hitting the ball hard on every given opportunity.
On the other hand, Dickwella tried to complement Munaweera, but a brain-freezing moment saw the opener trying to scoop a Bumrah delivery over third man. The result; the stumps were sent cart-wheeling.
Dilshan Munaweera continued his carnage, as he reached a 26-ball half-century. Sri Lanka were looking all set to cut loose at 99-3 in 11 overs, before Kuldeep Yadav’s mystery china-man got the better of Munaweera.
Kohli brought the other leg-spinner in Chahal, who dismissed Perera and Shanaka to hurt the hosts.
However, Ashan Priyanjan’s unbeaten 40 and Isuru Udana’s unbeaten 19 helped Sri Lanka crawl their way to 170, which was below-par after the blistering start by Munaweera.
In the 2nd innings, it was a typical India display. Rohit Sharma was taken out early by Malinga, but KL Rahul finally found some confidence. He was looking good after managing a 18-ball 24, before his cover-drive was brilliantly caught by Shanaka off Prasanna.
The rest was just copy-paste from the previous limited-overs game of the tour. Virat Kohli was joined by another middle-order batter, this time, Manish Pandey. The skipper, in support of Pandey, led his team to the finish line yet again, as the hosts went flat with their bowling.
Virat Kohli managed a sparkling 82 off 54 alongside Manish Pandey, who stroked his way to an unbeaten 51 off only 36.
Even though Kohli was caught off Udana in the penultimate over, the 28-year-old put another record besides his name, scoring the most runs in successful chases in T20 Internationals.
Virat Kohli was awarded the Man of the Match award for yet another inhuman display of batting, as he led the Men in Blue to their 9th consecutive win of the tour.
On the other hand, a battered Sri Lanka will now tour the UAE for a series against Pakistan in October, while India await a limited-over tour of Australia later this month.
