Ever Seen a Proxy Captain on Cricket field?????

South African captain Faf du Plessis brought his deputy Bavuma to call the toss in an effort to change his side's fortunes but went on to lose its 10th successive toss in test matches in Asia.

India defeated Windies in a low profile series

                                        Good win by India over West Indies

A low profile series, A series in which everybody knew the result, everyone saw it coming but a win is a win and a win over west indies in west indies is always wonderful. This was the first assignment given to coach Anil Kumble and the way he and Kohli handled the troop is quite good to watch. India started off well with complete domination in the first test. Captain Kohli with his maiden double ton

 and Ashwin after been promoted to 6^th  position scoring a brilliant hundered. After scoring huge pile of runs it was now the turn of Indian bowlers who with in no time rushed into windies line up and just tormented the opposition.

The 2^nd test was also on a similar note, Windies were looking out of sorts , Ind was on top until the last day which saw history been made and the resilient west indies were able to save the match which was almost looked lost.

In the 3^rd test with a number of changes, a bit weakened Indian batting lineup and a morale booster draw for windies  were good enough to make for a good contest in 3^rd test. It started that way too with india winning the toss and opting to bat first were stumbling at 126/5. Kohli’s decision to keep vijay out and Sharma in was already criticized heavily and then came the duo of Ashwin and Saha. Ashwin with already a hundred in series and having scored all his three 100s against the same opposition was quite confident. On the other hand Saha with things to prove was a bit shaky. After a slow a steady start the duo started to look settled leading to a great recovery with India ending the day 1 at 234/5.

Day 2 started with another brilliant showdown by both these batsmen as both made brilliant tons with Saha’s maiden test ton. Indian inning came to an end with a decent 353. 

West indies responded solidily and the game was nicely poised until there came a special spell from Bhuvi opening the chances for India in the match which India grabbed with both hands. 

With scoring runs quickly in 2^nd innings, India set a target of 345 in 87overs. 

West indies looked completely confused in the middle and with almost all the batsmen preferring to stay on backfoot, they were reduced to 35/3 in just 13.2 ovs.

With the wicket of Roston Chase on ball of the series bowled by Ishant Sharma, The win was just the matter of time and took just 48 ovs. In total to wrap up the inning. With that Kohli became the only test captain to win two test matches in a series in west indies.    

It was indeed a great win for the Indians specially for the double K (Kohli and Kumble). It was great to see the intent, aggression and greed for win which has been lacking in the longer format for quite sometime now. Since Kohli has taken over things have changed dramatically, be it the chase in adelaide in australia or the series with lankans and proteas.

The bold decision taken by Kohli have highly paid off and the same reflected in this series. The decision to left out Vijay, Pujara,Mishra and Yadav was debatable but with the way Bhuvi has bowled, ashwin and saha taking responsibilities, the decision looked good.

 Although the decision of including Sharma and jadeja hasn't paid off  but the morale of team has been high and having selection issues for good reasons is always a great thing to have for any team. India still have loads of issues to resolve, be it the poor form of Dhawan, absence of a quality allrounder or a bowling unit which can dismantle any opposition on any kind of track.

Sri Lanka beat Australia claiming only the second test victory over them

First Test, Pallekele, day five

Sri Lanka 117 & 353: Mendis 176, Starc 4-84

Australia 203 & 161: Smith 55, Herath 5-54

Sri Lanka won by 106 runs

27 tests, 12 test series and 34 years it took for the lankan tigers to beat the mighty kangaroos for only the 2nd time in history of test cricket and it wasn't also less than a miracle after showing dismal performance at day 1. 

11 september, 1999 was the only other time australia got beaten by Sri lanka in a test match and that too when lankan team had greats in the game like Jayasuriya, Arvinda, Ranatunga, C. Vaas, Jayawardene. Although this time around the story was a little different, Aussies comin into the series as always the favorites and also ranked no. 1 test team while sri lanka on the other hand still finding the replacements of Sanga and Mahela. It was considered to be a one sided affair and the performance of sri lankan batsmen on day 1 only made the matter worse.

After bundling out for mere 117 on day 1 in home conditions it was all done and dusted for sri lanka.

It was only after the old wily fox Rangna hearth along with debutant Lakshan Sandakan bagged 4 wicket a piece that lankan felt they were back in the game. A solid start and good application was required from the lankan batsmen which has been their regular problem in past few matches.

 Although the start was not great for them in the 2^nd inning too loosing 2 wickets for 33 only but luckily for them a young man Kusal Mendis put his hands up and played a magnificent inning of 176 in only 254 balls. This fiery knock completely changed the complexion of the game and lankan team which was feeling completely down and out on the first day was looking confident for the very first time in the match.

 Even though the target of 268 was not a huge one but looking at the subcontinent conditions and history it was a tricky target. With bowlers making early inroads and reducing the visitors to 83 for 3 on day 4, one could expect a fascinating 5^th day cricket and it proved to be exactly that.

Australians were looking for a partnership but wickets kept tumbling one after another, specially after the fall of Mitch Marsh, Visitors completely lost the plot. With a competing position of 139/4 to 157/8 it seemd all lost for them. Peter nevill and Steve o’Keefe tried to bite the time by making just 4 runs of 178 balls making a world record but that also couldn’t prevent the host from wining their first test match after 17 long years and 2^nd only in almost 35 years. It was again the most experienced bowler R.Herath for them doing the damage with taking yet another fifer.

Now it will be a fascinating to see how aussies react to this shocking loss. Stay tuned for further updates.