A surprisingly clueless Indian batting unit was suffocated by Sri Lanka’s wily spinners, led by five-wicket hauler Dinath Velalj, as Rohit Sharma’s men were bowled out for 110 in the third and final ODI in Colombo on Wednesday. Had to face a shameful defeat. Sri Lanka won the three-match series 2-0 after the first match ended in a draw, the Islanders’ first bilateral ODI series win against India since 1997. Chasing a competitive target of 249 on the fast turner at Premadasa, India were bowled out. 138 out in 26.1 overs, and new head coach Gautam Gambhir will have some tough points to consider at the start of his tenure.

Left-arm spinner Villalage, who has hurt India with the bat so far, chose to impress the visitors with five for 27 after opener Avishka Fernando scored a well-paced 96 to guide Lanka to 248 for seven. delivered to

However, India started well enough, despite the early departure of Shibman Gill, to chase them down, courtesy of Rohit Sharma’s 20-ball 35, which included 18 from Mahesh Thiekshana.

The runs spread in a sequence of 6, 4, 4, 4 in the fourth over of the innings.

But the sweep, one of Rohit’s favorite shots, felled the Indian skipper. His attempt to play Village was ended by Kosal Mendes behind the stumps.

Once Rohit went back, the rest of the Indian batsmen were thrown into a whirlwind of confusion.

Virat Kohli (20) played for Bari when there was nobody and was declared before the leg at the village.

Rishabh Pant, who was playing his first ODI since returning from that horrific car accident, went down the track and was beaten in the air by Thikshina and eventually stumped by Kasal.

Ryan Prag, who made his ODI debut in place of Arsdeep Singh, didn’t offer a straight shot from leg-spinner Jeffrey Wenderse to be bowled.

In between, Shreyas Iyer also fell leg-before at the village, taking the total number of lbws and clean bowled outs in the Indian innings to seven, and no other piece of statistics confused Indian minds more. Will not present a clear picture.

“We knew they were used to small pitches and good wickets in India. So they would struggle on a big Premadasa ground. We knew we could take advantage by getting some spin on the wicket, and we have good spinners. Are,” Thikshina’s post-match comments regarding the tracks used during the TV ODI World Cup were like rubbing salt in the wound.

Lanka worked through the Indian bowling through opener Avishka Fernando (96, 102 balls, 9×4, 2×6) and Kosal (59, 82b, 4×4) before their spinners put the Indian batsmen in trouble.

India fought back through an excellent spell of off-spin from Parag (3/54) but had no real support apart from Kuldeep Yadav (1/36).

Fernando’s knock put the home side in control during the most assured batting phase so far in the series, before Parag fell mid-innings on a pitch that saw Sri Lanka’s mid-turn ratio increase. went.

But none of this can take credit for the efforts of Fernando, who forged two fine partnerships – 89 with Patham Nissanka (45, 65b, 5×4, 2×6) for the opening wicket and 82 with Kosal for the second wicket. .

Nissanka often matched his partner offensively, as evidenced by two sixes from left-arm spinner Axar Patel.

But the opening stand was cut by Aksar when Nissanka slotted a wide delivery into the hands of Pant.

Lanka stayed ahead of India through the Fernando-Kosal partnership, and were the first enforcers.

Fernando spoiled the figures of Mohammad Siraj (1/65 in 8 overs), who was exceptionally erratic in his line and length.

In fact, the Lincoln right-hander enjoyed Siraj’s extra pace which allowed him to force the Indian to hit his bread-and-butter pull shot for sixes twice in a row.

However, just as he was on the verge of hitting his fourth ODI century, Fernando lost a skid leg break to be caught in front of the wicket by Parag.

At 171 for two in the 36th over, Lanka had a perfect platform to push towards a total of around 280 or more.

But Parag removed skipper Charith Asalanka (10), who was caught leg-by-leg, and Villalage (2) denied Lanka pace up the order late on.

But Kosal and Kamindu Mendes added 36 runs for the seventh wicket and took the match out of India’s reach.

(Other than the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)