Sri Lanka on Wednesday beat India by 4 wickets in the second T20 international to level the series 1-1. Dhananjaya de Silva (40 not out) anchored a tricky Lankan chase against a depleted Indian team. After Krunal Pandya tested positive for COVID-19, nine Indian players were ruled out for selection. India was forced to play with four debutants and six specialist bowlers. One of them, Navdeep Saini, did not get to bowl as Sri Lanka won with two balls to spare.

Vice-captain Bhuvneshwar Kumar finished with figures of one for 21 in his four overs. He bowled three economical overs, before Chamika Karunartne hit a six off him in the 19th over. Sri Lanka scored 12 runs in the penultimate overs, leaving them only 8 to get off the last over. Defending 8 off the last over proved to be a task too tough for debutant Chetan Sakariya. 

One Indian bowler, who despite figures of two for 30, would be annoyed is Kuldeep Yadav. Yadav was let down on several occasions by the Indian fielders. Not only were a couple of catches dropped off his bowling, some poor effort in the outfield also spoilt his figures.

Yadav outfoxed opposition skipper Dasun Shanaka by shortening the length of his stock delivery — the one that turns into the right-hander drawing him out and Sanju Samson effected a smart leg-side stumping.

Being put in to bat first on a sluggish Colombo track, India put up 132 for five. Debutant Devdutt Padikkal, though, in his brief innings gave a glimpse of a bright future.

The degree of difficulty could be gauged by the fact that only seven boundaries and a six was hit in 20 overs with as many as 42 dot balls consumed by the visiting team batsmen.

Skipper Shikhar Dhawan (40 off 42 balls) aware of a thin-on experience batting line-up had a cautious approach on a track where the ball simply refused to come onto the bat and improvisation was the order of the day.

The third and final T20 will be played on Thursday.