MS Dhoni, the India captain, admitted that his side played poorly in the first Test against Sri Lanka in Galle, but stressed that Lady Luck played a part in the result going against them. India were beaten by 10 wickets in the match, with Muttiah Muralitharan, the retiring Sri Lanka off-spinner, taking his 800th and final Test wicket. Dhoni, India's wicketkeeper-batsman, expected marked improvement from the team ahead of the second of three Tests, starting tomorrow, in Colombo. But he told the Hindustan Times yesterday: "We were, to some extent, unlucky, because quite a few edges didn't carry to slip fielders.
"If you see the boundary percentage, there were quite a few scored between the keeper and the point fielder. It is important to have luck on your side, which never was on ours in this game," the 29-year-old said. Dhoni pointed out that it was the batting - considered India's forte - that let them down even though the inexperienced bowlers, which included Abhimanyu Mithun, the debutant, struggled to take 10 Sri Lankan wickets over two days.
"Whenever we had some kind of a partnership going, the Sri Lankan bowlers came up with a beautiful delivery to get the batsman out," Dhoni said. "Be it the first innings or the second innings, we were not really able to get any partnership going. Some of the deliveries they bowled were really difficult to keep out." * Agencies