CHANDIGARH: India’s left arm spinner Venkatapathi Raju’s sensational spell of five wickets for nine runs helped India send Sri Lanka hurtling towards its doom on the second day of the one test here Nov 24.
At stumps, Sri Lanka was tottering at 75 for eight in reply to India’s first innings 288 all out. The visitors still need 14 runs to avoid a follow on.
On an eventful day, India, 220 for six overnight, lost the remaining four wickets for the addition of 68 runs, Even for that, they owed a lot to Kiran More’s plucky unbeaten knock of 37.
When Sri Lanka began its knock 20 minutes after lunch, Kapil Dey struck in the second over of his spell and had Mahanama caught behind the wicket by more. With the score at 34, Manoj Prabhakar had the wicket of Samarasekera trapped leg before the wicket.
But the sensational twist to the match was provided by Raju playing his first test in India. He had the wickets of Arvind De Silva (5), Arjuna Ranatunga (1), Tillekeratne (0), Debutant Atapattu (0) and Rumesh Ratnayake (0) for just nine runs. His final analysis of the day read 14-10-9-5.
In fact this must be one of the most impressive bowling figures in: the annals of the game. He also became the sixth Indian bowler to take five wickets against the Si Lankans.
The Sri Lankans are now in danger of being dismissed for their lowest total ever. Their lowest so far is 97 against New Zealand in Kandy in 1983-84 and that against India is 141 at Nagpur in 1986-87.
The Sri Lankans’ hope now rests on one drop batsman Asanka Guru Sinha who is still unbeaten with 47. In his neat and compact innings which has so far lasted 210 minutes, he has hit four boundaries. The other not out batsman with him is Madurasinghe with one run to his credit.
Earlier, resuming at the lunch score of 276 for seven, India lost the last three wickets in 20 minutes while adding only 12 runs.
Raju failed to add to his lunch score of 14 but helped more add 36 invaluable runs for the eighth wicket. Raju was out LBW to a full pitched delivery from medium pacer Rumesh Ratnayake who was the most successful bowler today claiming three wickets for 60 runs in 21.5 overs.
Test recall Gopal Sharma (0) and Narendra Hirwani (also 0) did not last long. Kiran More tried his best to shield the rabbits from the strike but with Hirwani failing to beat an accurate throw from Mahanama at short third man, the Indian innings came to an end.
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Article extracted from this publication >> November 30, 1990
