Riding on Sri Lankan captain blistering knock of 78 runs of just 37 balls helped by poor fielding from the Indians Sri Lanka manage to register their first win of the tour by winning the first twenty20 international by 29 runs at Nagpur.
Chasing the huge target of 216 runs to win, India got a much needed brisk start by their openers Virendra Sehwag (26 runs of 14 balls) and Gautam Gambhir (55 runs of 26 balls). However a middle order did not able to capitalize on the start provided by their openers as they lost six quick wickets in the space of 32 deliveries to get themselves in the hole from which they never came out.
At one stage they were looking like to loose the game by the margin of more than 75 runs but thanks to some lusty blows by Ashish Nehra (22 runs of 13 balls) & Ashok Dinda (19 runs of 20 balls) in the end India manages to reach close to the target.
Earlier after put into bat, Sri Lanka played the first few overs with caution and once S.Jayasuriya settled down, he went after Ashish Nehra, hitting him with five fours in an over.
From there Sri Lanka never looked back as they hit each Indian bowler with ease. Sri Lanka was also helped by poor catching and ground fielding from the Indians. India dropped as many as five catches, missed a couple of run out chances.
Apart from Sangakara, T.Dilshan (34 runs of 33 balls), S.Jayasurya (26 runs of 20 balls), C.Kapugedara (47 runs of 20 balls) and A.Mathews (15 runs of 4 balls) were the other major contributor during Sri Lankan innings.
Now next twenty20 will be played on December 12th at Punjab C.A. Stadium, Mohali, Chandigarh.
