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India vs Sri Lanka, 1st ODI: Upul Tharanga urges Sri Lankan bowlers to step up

With the help of Shikhar Dhawan's ton and Virat Kohli's fifty, India walloped Sri Lanka in the first ODI at Dambulla by 34 runs.

Upul Tharanga © AFP
Upul Tharanga © AFP

With the help of Shikhar Dhawan’s ton and Virat Kohli’s fifty, India walloped Sri Lanka in the first ODI at Dambulla by 34 runs. While Kohli was more than happy to play the second fiddle, Dhawan continued from where he had left in the Tests. However, Sri Lanka’s misery seems to find no end. Upul Tharanga, who began his new innings as full-time captain for the side, failed to restore the faith on ailing Sri Lanka after the Test series loss. Although the top order provided a blistering start to the Sri Lanka innings, the lower rest collapsed. Tharanga felt the starts could have been developed to big scores. He also blamed the bowlers for being unable to put up a fight.

During the presentation ceremony, Tharanga mentioned that 300 was on the cards after a decent start. He also urged the bowlers to step up and work on the weaknesses for the upcoming games, “We started well but we did not capitalize after that. Someone should have carried on to get a big one after that. If you want to score 300, conversion of starts is important. This is what we have been lacking for the last 2-3 years. Everyone hasn’t been getting runs for us. At one stage it looked like we would get to 300 but unfortunately we couldn’t do it. We were restricted to 216 and in the end India played brilliantly. We need to learn from our mistakes here, someone needs to get a big one for us in the future. Even in the bowling, we need to step up.”

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