By virtue of their stirring win over Australia at the MCG on Sunday night, India have breathed life into the triangular series, in addition to doing their own prospects of a place in the finals no harm at all. The onus now is on winless Sri Lanka to do an India if the league phase is not to be reduced to a two-horse race.

In two games to date — one abandoned midway through, the other a complete mismatch — the World Cup finalists have looked out of sorts. They will necessarily have to pull up their socks at the Manuka Oval against a buoyant India on Tuesday so as not to be playing catch-up even at this early stage of the competition.

Where Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s band of warriors has been the revelation in the first week, Mahela Jayawardene’s men have been the disappointment. At the Gabba against India last Tuesday, they began strongly with the ball before falling apart as Gautam Gambhir and Dhoni latched on to them; at the SCG on Friday, their batsmen came a cropper against the guile and intelligence of the Australian attack on a surface not unlike the one at their beloved Premadasa.

Collectively, the Sri Lankans are yet to hit their straps. Jayawardene is optimistic a return to the venue where they kicked off their preparations for the tri-series with a comprehensive win over a Cameron White-led Prime Minister’s XI a fortnight back will bring them better tidings.

Optimism

That optimism will have to be tempered somewhat, now that a question mark hangs over the availability of Tillakaratane Dilshan, a key component of their middle-order, a handy off-spinner and perhaps the most brilliant fielder in the team. Dilshan has picked up an infection to his right knee, necessitating an incision to remove puss. He hobbled around during practice on Monday morning, and while Jayawardene said he should be fine, Dilruwan Perera will secretly be fancying his chances of earning a second one-day international cap. Should that happen, it will most likely necessitate Upul Tharanga to drop down the order. Farvez Maharoof coming into the team is a more likely option.

In many ways, but with much greater impact, Yuvraj Singh is to India what Dilshan is to the Lankans. The vice-captain has been India’s most influential one-day cricketer over the last few years, mostly with the bat. His lack of runs hasn’t hurt the team yet, but Yuvraj is intelligent enough to understand that with a talented young pack snapping at his heels, he must get his act together quickly.

Precious little has gone right for the Punjab left-hander on this tour. Not even the reshuffling of the batting order to accommodate him for the first two Tests stoked his competitive instincts as he failed to justify the restructuring. To compound his woes, he twisted his left knee — the same one that had gone under the scalpel to correct a cruciate ligament tear 16 months back —  at pre-match training during the Perth Test, an injury that kept him out of action until last Tuesday.

Lack of self-belief

Since making his way back, the 26-year-old hasn’t looked the part. His lack of self-belief is all too obvious. The authoritative, free-stroking Yuvraj that has dominated the limited-overs world for so long now has been replaced by a hesitant, tentative, uncertain batsman.

Scores of 2 and 3 have done little to inspire confidence; additionally, he has ceded his position at point to Rohit Sharma, bubbly and effervescent and therefore symbolic of the dynamic new India that Dhoni has not so much inherited as constructed.

Yuvraj has played enough cricket to understand what it takes to turn things around. Both at the Gabba and in Melbourne on Sunday, he had the opportunity to play himself in, get the feet moving and the board ticking over because when he came in to bat, there were plenty of overs left. Disappointingly, he grabbed neither chance.

There will be an element of poetic justice if he chose the Manuka Oval, where he emphatically played himself out of the Test eleven exactly a month back, to ressurect his disastrous tour to date. The first of the day matches of the tri-series will be played on a hard strip nicely rolled in, with plenty of runs written on it. Hopefully, Yuvraj can read it, too!

Teams (from):

India: Mahendra Singh Dhoni (capt), Virender Sehwag, Sachin Tendulkar, Gautam Gambhir, Rohit Sharma, Yuvraj Singh, Robin Uthappa, Irfan Pathan, Harbhajan Singh, S Sreesanth, Ishant Sharma, Manoj Tiwary, Dinesh Kaarthick, Munaf Patel, Piyush Chawla, Suresh Raina, Praveen Kumar.

Sri Lanka: Mahela Jayawardene (capt), Sanath Jayasuriya, Dilruwan Perera, Kumar Sangakkara, Upul Tharanga, Chamara Silva, Chamara Kapugedera, Chaminda Vaas, Lasith Malinga, Muttiah Muralitharan, Ishara Amerasinghe, Tillakaratne Dilshan, Farveez Maharoof, Nuwan Kulasekera, Chanaka Welegedara.