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With most of the first-choice players being rested, Team India’s bench strength played to its potential and drubbed Sri Lanka 5-0, ruthlessly. To start with, Virat Kohli as a captain gives an early indication that after MS Dhoni, Team India’s command is in safe hands while Ambati Rayudu and Akshar Patel chipped in with some fine performances. Here we look back at the five-match One-Day International (ODI) series between India and Sri Lanka and draft some of the positives for Team India.
1. Ambati Rayudu: Credit goes to Virat Kohli for promoting Ambati Rayudu up the order. The right-handed batsman, who mostly filled in the squad as reserve, made most of the opportunity and amassed 250 runs in five innings at an average of 62.50, which includes his maiden ton at Ahmedabad in the second ODI and a half-century in the last game. Rayudu looked like a decent middle-order batsmen who can shift gears when needed. Overall, he looks certain to travel to Australia with the World Cup squad.
2. Akshar Patel: Giving Ravindra Jadeja tough competition for the all-rounder’s spot is Akshar Patel. With his astute bowling Akshar managed to scalp 11 wickets (highest in the series) in five matches and maintained an impressive economy of 4.61. Kohli made him bowl in the difficult situations and the rookie responded productively. For instance, in last ODI Akshar finished with figures of 45-2, while spinners Ravi Ashwin and Karn Sharma went for 56-2 and 61-0 respectively in their 10 overs, with Angelo Mathews wreaking havoc.
3. Rohit Sharma: Coming back from an injury with same fluency and smashing a record-breaking 264 off 173 balls, Rohit Sharma not only showcased his talent, but made sure he stays at the top, opening the innings. However, he fell cheaply in last ODI at Ranchi, but Rohit by scoring the double ton has had an impressive comeback.
4. Virat Kohli: Keeping aside Virat Kohli’s batting, which anyhow was impressive, he looked a better captain as well, marshalling his troops appropriately. Taking powerplay early on and applying bowling changes, Kohli was judicious with his decision making. Coming back to his batting, Kohli scored 329 runs in the series including two half-centuries and a match winning century in the last ODI.
5. And the others: Umesh Yadav was another bright spot for India as he bowled with agility and provided breakthroughs, picking 10 wickets in four matches. Dhaval Kulkarni and Ishant Sharma too looked impressive with their bowling spells while Shikhar Dhawan, before being rested showed consistency with scores of 50 plus in three innings including a century as well.
All in all, it was a remarkable outing for Team India with fringe players contributing much to team’s success and thus strengthening India’s bench strength ahead of the World Cup, which is couple of months away.
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