Muttiah Muralitharan Says Sri Lanka Unlikely to Win Matches in India

Muralitharan said that Sri Lanka are unlikely to win any match in India as the hosts have an extremely strong and world-class batting line-up.

New Delhi: Sri Lankan off-spin legend Muttiah Muralitharan is not very optimistic about his country’s chances in at least the three-match Test series against India. Muralitharan said that Sri Lanka are unlikely to win any match in India as the hosts have an extremely strong and world-class batting line-up.

In an interview to Cricbuzz, Muralitharan said, “Our chances of winning a Test match in India, I would say, are slim. All teams have struggled to compete in India”. He added that India are ranked number one in the world at the moment and in last 13 years only two teams have won a series in India.

Pointing out that Indian batsmen have always been among the best, he said over the last couple of decades he himself faced batsmen like Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid, Sourav Ganguly, VVS Laxman, Gautam Gambhir, Virender Sehwag and Mahendra Singh Dhoni who have taken on the best bowlers in the world and come out on top. He added that the current Indian team, too, has talented and aggressive batsmen who can decimate any bowling attack.

“Our Test cricket seems to be doing okay, but we are struggling in shorter formats of the game. This will be a tough series and the characters of our boys will be tested,” Muralitharan told Cricbuzz.

However, Muralitharan was quick to state that in spite of a strong batting line-up, India have usually struggled in Sri Lanka.

India take on Sri Lanka in three Tests, One Day Internationals and T20Is each. While the first Test is in Kolkata from November 16, the second and third matches are in Nagpur and Delhi.

The offie, who is the world’s highest Test wicket-taker with 800 scalps in 133 matches and 534 ODI wickets along with 13 in 12 T20Is, played his last Test against India in July 2010 at Galle. He took eight wickets in that match which Sri Lanka won by 10 wickets.

His last ODI was the 2011 World Cup Final on April 2, 2011, which India won by six wickets. Muralitharan went wicketless in that match.