Colombo: Sri Lanka picked up a consolation win when Dasun Shanaka’s men humbled India by three wickets in the Duckworth-Lewis method in the third and final One-day International on Friday. India won the series 2-1, but not before the young Sri Lankan team shook them up in the last two games.
Chasing a modest target of 226 in a rain-affected game, opener Avishka Fernando (76 off 98 balls) and Bhanuka Rajapaksa (65 off 56 balls) came up with gritty half-centuries to take them to a much-needed win.
Praveen Jayawickrama and Akila Dananjaya picked three wickets each as Sri Lanka restricted India to 225 after the latter decided to bat. With the series already decided in favour of India, five players made their ODI debut for India on Friday - Samson, Nitish Rana, Rahul Chahar, Chetan Sakariya, and Krishnappa Gowtham.
Prithvi Shaw and Samson scored 49 and 46 runs, respectively. Suryakumar Yadav scored 40 before getting trapped in front of the stumps as none of the India batsmen reached a half-century in the game.
India got off to a bad start as they lost skipper Shikhar Dhawan in the third over. Shaw then stitched a 74-run stand for the second wicket with Samson.
The opening batsman fell just one run short of what would have been his maiden ODI fifty in the 16th over. Samson also departed a few overs later before rain halted the play.
After the game resumed, India suffered a collapse as the visitors kept losing wickets at regular intervals and were finally folded for 225/10. The match was been reduced to 47 overs per side due to rain.
Brief Scores: India 225/10 (Prithvi Shaw 49, S. Samson 46; Dananjaya 3-44) vs Sri Lanka 227/7 off 39 overs (A. Fernando 76, B. Rajapaksa 65; R. Chahar 3/54, C. Sakariya 2/34). Sri Lanka won by 3 wickets in DLS method.
