Rohit Sharma, KL Rahul Star In India's Dominant Win Over Sri Lanka

Rohit Sharma, KL Rahul hit brilliant centuries as India produced a dominating all-round performance to beat Sri Lanka by seven wickets at Headingley in Leeds on Saturday. By the virtue of the victory, India go top of the World Cup 2019 points table and will maintain their position provided Australia lose to South Africa in the day's later game. Rohit Sharma (103) and KL Rahul (111) dominated the chase from the outset of the match, forging a 189-runs stand, the highest by any team in World Cup 2019. The duo helped India cruise in the 265-run chase after India's new ball bowler Jasprit Bumrah starred with the ball registering figures of 3/37.

Sharma reached his milestone with a boundary off Kasun Rajitha to pass the mark set by Sri Lanka's Kumar Sangakkara, who scored four hundreds at the 2015 tournament.

He reached his century off 92 balls with 14 fours and two sixes but was dismissed shortly afterwards, caught by Angelo Mathews off the bowling of Rajitha.

Sharma, known as the "hitman", now leads the tournament's run-scoring charts with 647 runs in eight matches after hitting his third successive century.

He is only the fourth batsman after Sachin Tendulkar, Matthew Hayden and Shakib Al Hasan to score more than 600 runs at a single World Cup.

Skipper Virat Kohli remained unbeaten on 34 and Hardik Pandya hit the winning runs to give India a chance of finishing above group leaders Australia, playing South Africa in the later match at Old Trafford.

Rahul registered his first century of the tournament but was caught behind shortly before the end of the game off veteran paceman Lasith Malinga -- playing his final World Cup match -- after hitting 11 fours and one six in his 118-ball knock.

Earlier, Mathews hit his third one-day international century and put on 124 runs for the fifth wicket with Lahiru Thirimanne (53) to give Sri Lanka a respectable total after they were reeling at 55-4.

Jasprit Bumrah returned impressive figures of 3-37 in his 10 overs as India, who had already qualified for the semi-finals, restricted Sri Lanka with some quality bowling.

The 1996 champions finished their World Cup campaign with three wins, four defeats and two games ending in no result.

(With AFP inputs) 

Topics mentioned in this article

India Cricket Team Sri Lanka Cricket Team World Cup 2019 KL Rahul Rohit Sharma Sri Lanka vs India, Match 44 Cricket