It's a face-off that both India and Sri Lanka could have avoided, but they have only themselves to blame for turning their final encounter of the CB Series into a virtual semi-final for one and knockout for the other. Despite holding the edge on at least one occasion against Australia, both teams would envy Ricky Ponting's men letting their hair down at tomorrow's Allan Border medal presentation while they get into a dogfight at the Bellerive Oval.
Such has been the nature of this series so far that, apart from Australia, no team has consistently capitalised on the weaknesses of the opponents. In the three previous games between the two teams, India and Sri Lanka have one victory each while their first encounter of the series, in Brisbane, was abandoned due to rain. Sri Lanka stand on the precipice and to pull themselves back they need to defeat India and then repeat that result against Australia on Friday. India, meanwhile, will seal their berth in the final if they win on Tuesday.
"We wouldn't like to wait for the result on February 29," Mahendra Singh Dhoni said. "We would like to seal the match against Sri Lanka and not leave it to the last game between Australia and Sri Lanka. This game is very important for us." The Indian captain has already alerted his troops about the task, terming Sri Lanka "very tricky" opponents.
Sri Lanka have the advantage of having played at this venue twice this season. They lost a Test here in November and then Tasmania slapped a seven-wicket defeat on them in the practice game ahead of the tri-series. "The Test-match wicket was much harder compared to the practice match that was played on a different one, but we have a fair idea of the wicket. It depends on the conditions, which can be overcast here sometimes, so we'll wait and see," Mahela Jayawardene, Sri Lanka's captain, said after a net session.
The conditions played a huge role in the last one-day match at the ground, when Tasmania won a closely fought encounter on Saturday to lift the Ford Ranger Cup by one wicket after rain interruptions converted Victoria's original target of 158 to 131 in 31 overs. The forecast for Tuesday is mostly sunny with temperatures in the range of 20°C. The wicket at the Bellerive Oval is likely to offer significant sideways movement, which could be a key factor for both captains when they sit down to choose their final XIs.
Dhoni already has a couple of issues to tackle, one of which is the failure of his opening pair, Sachin Tendulkar and Virender Sehwag. One option could be to push Robin Uthappa, who scored a 46-ball 51 down the order on Sunday against Australia, ahead of Sehwag. Dhoni doesn't want to disturb an in-form Gautam Gambhir's fine run at No.3 but felt he had enough options to choose from.
The other matter is that of fatigue. Players like Dhoni and Ishant Sharma have been playing non-stop from the start of the Test series and India's inability to qualify for the finals means these two have had no time to rest. "It's tough on guys like Ishant and Gautam, but we have some time to recover and we need them," was Dhoni's response to whether a 36-hour break was enough for the team to bounce back after yesterday's game against Australia.
Without any indication of the combination he will opt for, Jayawardene's focus was on tomorrow and not too far down the road. "We have to win both the games. If we get our batting sorted out, we have a very good chance," he said. "We need to concentrate first on getting the victory on Tuesday."
Both teams have their share of top-order batting concerns and there's an outside chance, given the Hobart conditions, that they both go in with five bowlers. If Munaf Patel recovers from a bout of food poisoning suffered on Saturday he might just sneak into the Indian XI. Sri Lanka, on the other hand, have dropped Farveez Maharoof and Chanaka Welegedara. Tillakaratne Dilashan is likely to continue in the middle order, with one out of Upul Tharanga and Dilruwan Perera opening with Sanath Jayasuriya. Depending on the conditions, they will choose from Chamara Kapugedera and Nuwan Kulasekara for the last spot in the XI.
Teams
India: (likely) 1 Robin Uthappa, 2 Sachin Tendulkar, 3 Gautam Gambhir, 4 Rohit Sharma, 5 Mahendra Singh Dhoni (capt & wk), 6 Yuvraj Singh, 7 Irfan Pathan, 8 Harbhajan Singh, 9 Sreesanth, 10 Ishant Sharma, 11 Munaf Patel.
Sri Lanka: (from) Sanath Jayasuriya, Upul Tharanga, Dilruwan Perera, Tillakaratne Dilshan, Kumar Sangakkara (wk), Mahela Jayawardene (capt), Chamara Silva, Chamara Kapugedera, Chaminda Vaas, Muttiah Muralitharan, Ishara Amerasinghe, Nuwan Kulasekara, Lasith Malinga.