Centurian Dravid leads India to 642, Lanka 66 for 1

Rahul Dravid (144) struck a magnificent century before left-arm spinner Rangana Herath pegged back the Indian charge with a five-wicket haul to dismiss the hosts for 642 runs in their first innings on the second day of the second Test at the Green Park stadium here today.

At stumps, Sri Lanka were trailing by 576 runs with Kumara Sangakkara (29) and Tharanga Paranavitana (30) at the crease after Tillakaratne Dilshan was out off the first ball of the innings.

While Dravid scored his 28th Test century to overtake former Australian skipper Alan Border as the fourth highest run-scorer in Test cricket, Yuvraj Singh and VVS Laxman struck a half-century each. With a daunting total to chase, Sri Lanka were off to a horrendous start when a Zaheer Khan delivery that pitched outside the leg-stump got the leading edge from Dilshan and was caught by debutant Pragyan Ojha at mid-on.

Towards the end of the innings, Harbhajan did get good purchase from the track and had some close appeals against both Sangakkara and Paranavitana.

But the two batsmen did well to ressurect the innings and added 66 runs without any loss after the early blow of Dilshan.

Laxman (63) played a characteristic knock off 121 balls before he fell for a flighted delivery from Rangana Herath and was caught at mid-off. Yuvraj (67) at the other end was still going strong after Rahul Dravid's 28th Test century in the morning put India in an even more authouritative position. Harbhajan Singh (5) was cleaned up by Herath just at the stroke of tea as he followed his captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni (4) who was out in the same manner while Yuvraj was still at the crease.

The Indian tail failed to wag as the lower order crumbled in Herath's final spell in which he claimed four wickets for 18 runs.

The left-arm spinner returned figures of five for 121 in his 33 overs.

Yuvraj played brilliantly as he mixed aggression with some mature strokeplay all over the ground and had four boundaries and a couple of sixes in his 105-ball stay until he was caught at mid-on off Ajantha Mendis. Earlier in the morning, India continued their run scoring spree on the second day as well although, the hosts lost both their overnight batsmen Dravid (144) and Sachin Tendulkar (40) for the addition of 118 runs in the pre-lunch session.

Resuming at the overnight score of 417 for two, Dravid and Tendulkar made steady progress as India plundered runs at a good pace.

Soon Dravid, who was batting on 85 overnight, notched up his second successive century in the series with a straight drive that raced past the bowler.

Dravid looked in fine touch for his 144 which came off 226 balls and had 15 boundaries and a six over the long-on fence.

Dravid in particular, looked fluent with his strokeplay all over the ground and with Tendulkar added 94 runs for the third wicket stand.

Tendulkar launched Mendis over the long-off boundary for a six but the little master decided yet again to come down the track and was caught at mid-off in the very same over for 40.

For Dravid, it was the most unfortunate manner to get dismissed when he was at the non-striker's end and Laxman hit the ball straight to bowler Herath who palmed it to the stumps with Dravid out of his crease.

Sangakkara was then forced to make another bowling change and he brought in left-arm spinner Rangana Herath into the attack only to see Dravid lofting him over the long-on fence for a six.

-- (UNI) -- 25SPD19.xml

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