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Rishabh Pant’s explosive 66 off 69 balls headlined India’s second innings of 193, setting Sri Lanka a 372-run victory target in Galle. Asitha Fernando took 4-41 as India’s middle order crumbled around Pant. In reply, Mohammed Siraj bounced out Nishan Madushka for 6 in the seventh over, before Manav Suthar dismissed Pasindu Sooriyabandara for a golden duck off the very first ball and then removed Lahiru Udara, with Prasidh Krishna accounting for Kamindu Mendis, reducing Sri Lanka to 84/4 at stumps. Captain Dhananjaya de Silva (31*) and first-innings centurion Sonal Dinusha (25*) are the last resistance. India need six wickets on Day 5; Sri Lanka need 288 — the highest chase in Galle’s history by a vast margin.
Rishabh Pant’s typically irreverent 66 off 69 balls was the centrepiece of India’s second innings of 193, setting Sri Lanka a daunting 372-run victory target — a figure that would represent the highest successful chase in Galle’s Test history by a massive margin. India’s bowlers then set about their work with relish. Mohammed Siraj struck immediately, Manav Suthar claimed two wickets in a searching 12-over spell — including a first-ball golden duck — and Prasidh Krishna chipped in to reduce Sri Lanka to 84 for 4 at stumps, with captain Dhananjaya de Silva unbeaten on 31 and first-innings centurion Sonal Dinusha providing company on 25. India need six wickets on the final day; Sri Lanka need 288 runs. Only one outcome looks plausible.
Galle, Sri Lanka: Day 4 of the first Test in Galle was the day the match found its inevitable shape. India, who had resumed their second innings with a 178-run first-innings lead, batted with intent and urgency — losing wickets at regular intervals but never losing sight of the primary goal: bat Sri Lanka out of the game and leave them with a target that history makes look impossible. By the time Asitha Fernando claimed the final wicket to end India’s second innings for 193, the target of 372 sat above the Sri Lankan dressing room like a gathering storm.
Then India’s bowlers stepped out into a deteriorating pitch — the sort of spitting, turning, uneven surface that Galle always produces in its final throes — and immediately made their presence felt.
India’s Second Innings: Intent Over Elegance
India began Day 4 batting, and from the first over the intent was clear: this was not a morning for accumulation but for declaration-readying acceleration. It started badly. Yashasvi Jaiswal edged Asitha Fernando’s very first delivery behind to Niroshan Dickwella — a seventh Test dismissal via the cut or edge against pace, a pattern that will require addressing — and departed for a duck, leaving India 0 for 1.
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KL Rahul and Devdutt Padikkal then combined for a partnership of 65 that was one of the day’s highlights — breezy, punchy, and occasionally decorated by the kind of unspoken communication that only long-time teammates possess. Rahul clouted Prabath Jayasuriya for two sixes in quick succession, one over long-off and another to the sight screen, in a statement that briefly announced India’s aggressive second-innings intent. He was eventually dismissed for 35 after surviving a review — a leg-before given on the field that Padikkal convinced him to challenge and which replays overturned — only for him to fall shortly afterwards to Lahiru Kumara.
Padikkal extended his magnificent match to 44 before Keshara Nuwantha trapped him lbw, a decision upheld on review, after finding an off-spinner that nipped back sharply off the pitch. Captain Shubman Gill contributed a brief cameo before being caught on the crease, the ball going past his inside edge from Suthar — for whom India’s batting collapse was, of course, also a moment of Sri Lankan bowling review to be noted. Dhruv Jurel followed, and the middle order was trimmed to nothing before Pant walked in.
Pant Turns the Afternoon Into His Own
Rishabh Pant is not a batter who does ordinary cricket. On a pitch that was already turning, already offering variable bounce, already making survival an achievement for most — Pant treated the conditions as an invitation to play a completely different game from everyone else. He charged Nuwantha over cow corner. He walked into Jayasuriya’s straight ones and drilled them back past the bowler. He hit a rope-clearing six that drew a gasp from the sparse crowd.
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His 66 off 69 balls was not chanceless — there were moments of fortune — but it was definitively match-altering. India had been drifting at 115 for 6 when Pant arrived. By the time he was the ninth wicket to fall, caught behind off a short Fernando delivery that found the edge as Pant pushed hard at one angled across him, India had 193 on the board and a lead of 371.
Manav Suthar (9) and Kuldeep Yadav (5) contributed brief tail-end cameos before Asitha Fernando cleaned up Prasidh Krishna for 2 to complete figures of 4 for 41 — the pick of Sri Lanka’s bowlers. Jayasuriya took 3 for 46, Kumara 2 wickets, and Nuwantha the scalp of Padikkal.
The Record That Confronts Sri Lanka
With a target of 372 set, the weight of history descended swiftly on the Sri Lanka dressing room. The highest successful Test chase at the Galle International Stadium is 344, achieved by Pakistan in 2022. A 200-plus target has been successfully chased only twice at this ground since 1998. Those are the numbers Sri Lanka stared down as they walked out to bat in a rain-interrupted afternoon session on a pitch that had been deteriorating visibly across four days.
It showed immediately. Mohammed Siraj, who had dismissed Nishan Madushka in the first innings with an outswinger that angled away, tried the same trick again — only for Madushka to keep denying him for six watchful runs. Siraj eventually found the answer with a bouncer in the seventh over. Madushka attempted the hook but could not keep it down, the top edge lobbing comfortably to Prasidh Krishna in the deep. Siraj had his man, Sri Lanka were 14 for 1, and India were in business.
Suthar then produced the delivery of the day in his very first over of the evening. Pasindu Sooriyabandara — debuting as a concussion substitute for the injured Dinesh Chandimal — was hit on the pad first ball by a delivery that went straight on, beat the inside edge and crashed into the stumps according to ball-tracking after India successfully reviewed the on-field not-out decision. Sooriyabandara’s golden duck was a brutal introduction to Test cricket at this level.
Prasidh Krishna then accounted for Kamindu Mendis — a short-of-length delivery that bounced more than expected, drawing a loose slash that produced an outside edge straight to KL Rahul at first slip, gone for 2. Sri Lanka were 21 for 3.
Suthar struck again to claim his second wicket of the evening, removing Lahiru Udara who sliced a touch shorter delivery to Jaiswal at backward point — a muted dismissal that nonetheless sent India firmly into Sri Lanka’s middle order.
At 48 for 4, the match was effectively over. But stumps arrived early — the light failing with 34 overs bowled and Sri Lanka at 84 for 4 — denying India the chance to press further advantage on the evening. De Silva (31*) and Dinusha (25*) will return on Day 5 to begin what will need to be one of cricket’s great rearguard efforts simply to delay the inevitable.
What Day 5 Holds
India need six wickets. Sri Lanka need 288 runs. The pitch, which has been deteriorating with each session, will offer India’s bowlers — led by the excellent Suthar and the experience of Mohammed Siraj — even more on the final morning. Ravindra Jadeja, who was outstanding in the first innings with three wickets, bowled tidily in the evening session without a reward and will be desperate to add to his match tally.
The only variables are weather — rain has interrupted every day of this Test — and the remarkable individual resilience of Dhananjaya de Silva, one of the finest crisis batters in Asian cricket. His 31 not out has already featured several shots of vintage quality on a surface that makes shot-making a considerable challenge.
But 288 from a deteriorating Galle pitch on the final day, with six wickets in hand, against a full-strength India attack? History is firmly on India’s side.
Scorecards at Stumps — Day 4
India 1st innings: 462 (Padikkal 167, Rahul 82, Jurel 51)
Sri Lanka 1st innings: 284 (Dinusha 100, Dickwella 80; Suthar 4 wkts, Jadeja 3 wkts)
India 2nd innings: 193 (Pant 66, Padikkal 44, Rahul 35; Asitha Fernando 4-41, Jayasuriya 3-46, Kumara 2-wkts)
Sri Lanka 2nd innings: 84/4 (34 overs) — de Silva 31*, Dinusha 25*; Suthar 2-30, Siraj 1-11
Target: Sri Lanka require 372 to win | Need: 288 more runs | India need 6 wickets
Record context: Highest successful chase at Galle is 344 (Pakistan, 2022)
