• Source:JND
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India continued their winning momentum in the Asia Cup as they secured a final berth after defeating Sri Lanka by 41 runs in the Super Four match at R Premadasa Stadium in Colombo on Tuesday. After the win, India skipper Rohit Sharma admitted that the target was tricky to defend on the pitch and Sri Lanka put them under pressure in the match.

Batting first, India posted a mediocre total of 213/10 in 49.1 overs on a spin-friendly pitch. In reply, Sri Lanka were reduced to 172/10 in 41.3 overs to bring an end to their 13-match long winning streak in the ODIs.

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"Was a good game. For us also to play a game like that under pressure on a slightly challenging pitch. Challenging in a lot of aspects. Definitely looking to play on pitches like this to see what we can achieve, we might as well come here and play on pitches like these," Rohit said in the post-match presentation.

For India, spinner Kuldeep Yadav was the pick of the bowlers with the figures of 4-43 in 9.3 overs after bagging a fifer-er against arch-rivals Pakistan on Monday. Lauding the leg-spinner, Rohit shed light on the hard work that Kuldeep has done in the last few years.

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"For the past year or so bowling really really well. He has done a lot of hard work on his rhythm. He went back to the drawing board and worked on it. The ball is coming out nicely and you can see the results in the last 10 ODIs," he said.

Jasprit Bumrah and Ravindra Jadeja also picked two scalps each while Hardik Pandya and Mohammed Siraj took one wicket each.

Pandya was the most economical among the bowlers and was hitting a good length on the pitch. He was almost unplayable with his out-swing deliveries.

"He (Hardik) has worked really hard in his bowling for the last couple of years. It doesn't happen overnight and it's pleasing to see. He looked like taking a wicket off every ball. Was not an easy target to defend as the pitch got easier at the end and we had to put it consistently in one area and I think we did quite well," Rohit concluded.

India will next take on Bangladesh in their last Super Four clash on Friday, September 15.