Sri Lanka Vs India – Is it time to reignite the rivalry?

Asia Cup 2022

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When it comes to cricket, there are a lot of rivalries with the main ones being England vs Australia and India vs Pakistan. But apart from those there have been some interesting rivalries which don’t get mainstream attention like the above mentioned two, but still produced some great moments.

One of those rivalries which had a lot of steam and generated a heavy amount of buzz was India vs Sri Lanka. But it’s fair to say that since 2015 that rivalry is no longer a real rivalry with India clearly dominating Sri Lanka in all formats. Over the past 6/7 years India developed and improved their game to become a world giant in the sport but unfortunately for Sri Lanka, everything went on a downward spiral as Sri Lanka were relegated to a level of playing qualifiers at the T20 World Cup.

When it comes to the Asia Cup, India have the most titles with 7 and Sri Lanka are in second place with 5. From the completed 14 editions of the tournament, India and Sri Lanka have ended the tournament taking the top two places 8 times. To go with that these two teams have one each in the finale of the T20 and ODI World Cups to go with a semi-final clash in the 50 over World Cup back in 1996. But all the richness of this rivalry, sadly died down due to Sri Lanka failing in the international level for an extended period of time.

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But with the recent resurgence of Sri Lanka during the last year, is it finally time for the rivalry to heat up a bit once again ? Sri Lanka are riding high after the win against Afghanistan and the Indians are actually under pressure, which would certainly make things interesting today. A win today will put Sri Lanka as the frontrunners to qualify for the finals while for India, they will need to depend on Afghanistan winning against Pakistan and then Sri Lanka beating Pakistan as well. And India themselves must beat Afghanistan in their last encounter. So, with a lot at stake, both the teams will definitely come out today all guns blazing and for the first time in a long time, maybe the Sri Lankans actually have more momentum than India.

This team is actually good, yes you might not see big names on paper, but if there’s any example to show why this team is better now, the fact that most of these players are being sought after in franchise leagues is the perfect answer. There was an era where Sri Lankan players were simply rejected but look where they are now.

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It’s the perfect time to reignite the rivalry between the two Asian powerhouses. This may not happen at this Asia Cup, but that whole mindset of that Sri Lanka is going to lose against India whenever they play against them could stop now.

Until 2015, an encounter between Sri Lanka and India was a much awaited one for both countries. How Sanath Jayasuriya annihilated the Indian bowlers back then to Virat Kohli destroying the Lankan bowlers, we have seen some amazing moments. In T20I cricket these two teams were neck and neck until 2016 but after that India were simply too good. In fact until 2016, Sri Lanka led the T20I tally between the two teams 4 to 3 but now it’s 17 to 7 in favour of India. That shows how much ground Sri Lanka has to cover now.

This current Sri Lankan bunch is one of the most talented set of players to play together for Sri Lanka since 2015. And India of course have star players like Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli, KL Rahul, Hardik Pandya etc. But even though they have all these big names, it really shouldn’t bother the players nor the fans because if Sri Lanka can actually believe in themselves and their ability, we are not very far from the day that Sri Lanka Vs India becomes a full-blown rivalry in World Cricket once again.