Chamara Kapugedera has been dropped, not rested for the 4th ODI

Sri Lanka’s stand-in skipper Chamara Kapugedera was earlier reported to have been ruled out of the next ODI due to a back injury, but putting more light on the issue; it has been reported that the captain has been forcefully rested for the next match, mainly due to the incorrect decision of opting to bat first, which resulted in a 6-wicket defeat for the hosts. It has been learned that the team management was not happy with the skipper’s decision to bat first.

Interestingly, apart from the last ODI, Indian captain Virat Kohli has won all the tosses on this tour so far. The Sri Lankan team management had decided to field, if the home side wins the toss. But the Sri Lankan skipper went ahead and chose to bat. The hosts could manage only 217, as the skipper scored just 14 with the bat.

Apart from Lahiru Thirimanne’s 105-ball 80, no other batsman contributed profoundly to the total. Jaspirt Bumrah picked up his career best figures of 5/27, as India clinched a victory with 29 balls to spare and more importantly an unassailable lead of 3-0, in the 5-match series.

Too many dot balls

In the post match conference, the Sri Lankan skipper said “I thought it was a good wicket, so put some score on the board and hopefully we can defend, and like the last game we hoped it would grip a bit in the evening. Things didn’t go to our plans. We discussed about not playing dot balls in the middle overs, but things didn’t work out. 260-275 would have been a challenging score. I enjoyed captaincy – it was pressure, but I enjoyed it, and hopefully we can win next time.”

For the visitors, Rohit Sharma was the stand out performer with the bat, as he scored an unbeaten 124, well supported by MS Dhoni. Dhoni remained unbeaten on 67 and stitched an unbeaten partnership with the opener.