Late evening Blues (Blows)

It was another tame, late evening madness in the fading light at Kotla; 4 Lankan wickets fell in some 20 minutes and Kumble was back in stride. Jayasurya must be wondering, what his replacements in the Test team are up to. Gunawardane repeated the Gambhir act of 3rd failure and Samaraweera played a nothing shot in the last over. Attappattu started it all with a charge to be C&B and Tauffel accounted for Bandara. Marvan also missed a trick by sending in Mubarak ahead of the shaky Samaraweera.
In the morning, I am not sure what Sourav was upto. He was in a camatose mood (not for the 1st time though) and playing for a place in the next test team, neither he nor Yuvi were prepared to even strike the ball hard. Sourav hogged the strike for the most part and played in a manner, as if India wanted a dead game. Dada's time is up. By not playing fluently in this pitch, where the ball rarely rose beyond the boot lace, he showed once again why he needs to be given a decent send off. Any further hanging around is going to be utter injustce to the potential of Yuvaraj in tests. (Well !! I can hear the usual excuses from his supporters. The ball was keeping low and he has to see off the initial overs and all that. Give me a break ! This attack of Lanka is no great shakes for such an ultra cautious approach). Normal service was only restored when Dhoni injected some urgency into the proceedings with a typical sledge hammer innings. This is a good sign since I have been preaching about the need to score quickly in tests too. In the coming years, Dhoni's quick fire knocks can become invaluable as much in tests, as in ODIs.
It should be a formality from here but I have seen the odd display of defiance in Indian soil before and a chance for any result other than Indian win looks slim but not impossible.