HI friends, in this article we will discuss about the rockets launched by the Indian batsman, i.e. hitting the balls to fours and sixes and frustrated the Sri Lankan bowlers and fielders, because they tried their level best to take wickets at regular intervals, but failed and they ended the second day of the third test at Mumbai, with just picking the wicket of Murali Vijay. The Lankans started the second day with a hope that they could cross 400 runs mark at the minimum, since Mathews was there at the end of the first day with 86 runs and with a set batsman at the crease they hoped that they could even cross 450 runs.

But their hopes shattered, and Mathews also missed his maiden test century as he was run out by Sachin Tendulkar. In fact he was on 98 and when he tried for the second run, to get his hundred, he got out. The Lankans who finished the first day with 366/8 now realized that 450 is asking for too much, since the inform batsman Mathews was out. So they tried to reach at least 400, but unfortunately finished their first innings with 393 runs, with the top scorer being Tilakaratrne Dilshan.

When we consider the Indian bowling attack, this time spinners dominated the bowling attack as the spinners were responsible for the seven wickets, with Harbhajan picking 7 wickets and 3 wickets for Ojha. Zaheer and Sreesanth picked one wicket each. So India contained Sri Lanka to an extent and next it was in the hands of the Indian batsmen to play well and win the match for India. Another fear that was in the mind of people is the absence of Gautam Gambhir, due to his sister’s marriage, which gave way to Murali Vijay to fill his place.

So as usual India started their innings with over a 5 in an over and to everybody’s surprise, it was Murali Vijay who scored majority of the score and also looks dominative than Sehwag for the first half an hour. Sehwag approached slow and steady, as he did in Kanpur and as usual he reached his fifty first than his partner. He reached his 50 with less than 100 strike rate and after that he slowly started to increase his strike rate and the end of the day he finished with a score of 284 not out in 239 balls with 40 fours and 7 sixes.

I could clearly see there were a large number of crowds as the day progressed and this is due to the aggressive Indian batting and mainly due to Sehwag. At this instant we must not forget the contribution of Murali Vijay who supported Sehwag very well and also shared a 221 runs opening partnership with Sehwag, which was a record in this stadium. Murali Vijay made his maiden test century and that too in his second test match, but when he was about to get his maiden test century he was out LBW, as he played a bad shot at that time. But no worries, as he contributed very well for the team and never made us think that Gambhir was missing.

So Vijay’s wicket gave way to the wall and the inform batsman Rahul Dravid who has already scored a couple of centuries and who is in the form of his life. A very strong contender for the man of series, Dravid made sure that India doesn’t los any more wickets and he also shared an unbeaten 222 runs partnership with Sehwag. He finished the day with 62 runs not out and hope India gets a huge lead in day 3 and most importantly Sehwag gets his 300, because if he does he will be the only player in the history to have scored 330 runs thrice. Let us also hope that he breaks Brian Lara’s record of highest runs in a single innings by crossing 400 runs. India finished the day with 443/1 and has a great chance of winning this test match and if we win we will be the number one side in test cricket.

• Written by Raaghavan Krishnamurthy.
• In category Cricket.
• 14 years ago.

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