Sachin and Gambhir frustrated Sri Lankans to draw the first Test at Motera
Master blaster Sachin Tendulkar has reached another milestone in his career by completing a phenomenal 30,000 runs in international cricket during the ongoing Ahmedabad Test against Sri Lanka on Friday. Tendulkar, who completed 20 glorious years in cricket on Sunday (November 15), needed 35 runs to reach the landmark at the start of India’s second innings in the Ahmedabad Test against Sri Lanka. Next in line for the feat is is Australia captain Ricky Ponting, who had recently crossed 24,000 runs.
Tendulkar has 17,178 runs in ODI cricket, 10 runs in the only T20 International he’s played, and 12,878 Test runs after the first test against Sri Lanka in Ahmedabad on 19th November 2009.He holds the record for most ODI and Test runs and centuries. He also completed his 43rd test century in the just concluded test. Tendulkar is clearly widening the gap between him and his contemporaries and it is certainly going to be difficult for anybody to catch up with the great batsman.
Drawn Test: Seven centuries, including a double century, nearly 1600 runs for only 21 wickets came from the dead Motera pitch. Although four of the seven centuries come from Indian batsmen, Sri Lanka was always dominating from day one and by the end of the fourth day it seemed that they could record their first test win in India. But the determined Gambhir and Sachin frustrated their plans. Lankans were so much frustrated that they started bowling way out side the stumps. In the end, the Indian batsmen Sachin and Laxman progressed through singles and both completing their century and half century, respectively.
Sri Lankan innings was marked by 275 from Mahela Jayawardene and 154 from Prasanna Jayawardene and 112 from T Dilshan.Sri Lanka started the day 144 ahead, and needed eight Indian wickets to force a result, but met a docile pitch and determined batting. The only break in concentration came in the second session when Gambhir stepped out to launch Rangana Herath out of the ground, and ended up losing his wicket. That was not before he had reached his seventh century: four of them, including his last three, have come in the second innings, two of them in match-saving scenarios. He now averages 59.55 in the second innings, against 54.22 overall.
Gambhir, at the other end, was in his Napier-like mode from earlier this year, when he batted 643 minutes for 137 runs to save the Test. Even today, he was not interested in scoring, or in other words he didn’t let being stuck at one end bother him much. Angelo Mathews bowled well in Prasad’s absence, hitting good lengths consistently, getting some of them to stay low and getting the odd one to seam away off the rare crack on the pitch. But Gambhir took most of the strike to him, playing 30 consecutive balls from Mathews for no run in the first hour, certain in his judgement outside off, and coming forward to straighter deliveries to negate the odd shooter.
Against spinners, Gambhir preferred to stay back, or jump out of the track and get close enough to the delivery. He did pull out the big hits in the 90s, as he is used to doing because he prefers to get the 90s done with quickly. He took 61 deliveries to move from overnight 74 to 90, but then hit three boundaries in six balls to reach his century quickly. And then scored two runs in 25 deliveries. The approach in the 90s was similar to that in Napier, when he stepped out and lofted Daniel Vettori and Jeetan Patel for fours in consecutive overs.
Post lunch, when Gambhir played his only rash shot, he left the saunter towards safety in Tendulkar’s hands. Tendulkar had started off fluently, driving Murali against the spin for two boundaries, and punching Mathews for one, and once he got comfortable in the middle he too opted to play for time. Between them Gambhir and Tendulkar played out 24 overs. The latter had reached 32 off 75 deliveries, and slowed down even more after that.
Sri Lanka tried one of the last rolls of the dice, taking the new ball and getting Prasad to bowl despite the injury. But neither Prasad nor Chanaka Welegedara could find enough from the pitch to disturb Tendulkar or VVS Laxman. For a while Tendulkar shut shop completely, scoring three runs in 26 deliveries. By that time he had reached 30,000 international runs, and it seemed torturous to make the fast bowlers keep bowling on this pitch.
The spinners came back on, the match started moving towards a slow draw again. By tea Tendulkar had crossed 50, India had erased the deficit, and Tendulkar and Laxman had played out another 24 overs. Post the interval, both Tendulkar and Laxman batted with more intent, in the knowledge that the game had been saved. Sri Lankan bowlers tried various angles of attack, but there was little left to play for, and both the batsmen duly reached personal milestones. — Inputs from Cricinfo.
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