Lions hammer the Tigers.

Once again the Indians have lost a crucial final. This time the Asia Cup 2008 and the Sri Lankans capture it after a wonderful spell by the 'Man of the Match' and 'Man of the Tournament' - Ajantha Mendis. It was Mendis all the way for Sri Lanka.

It was great to see the bowlers take the centre stage in the Asia Cup finals. With all teams pretty confident of chasing 300+ targets in this series the Indians decided to send the Lions to bat first after winning the toss. This was a decision by the rather confident Indian team just after beating the Sri Lankans in the previous game. What they did not consider before making the decision was Mendis. The Indian side did not have a preview of Mendis in the previous game and it was a master stroke by Mahela not to play him in the previous game.

The Indian bowlers did their job in the first innings of the match. Ishant and RP Singh taking 3 wkts each. They restricted the Sri Lankans to 273. The Indians would have thought that it was a very easy target to chase especially after having 7 good batsmen in the side. Indeed it was a easy target if you remove Mendis from the match. Sehwag gave the Indian team a great start. But then Mendis started doing wonders for the Lankans. He took 6 wkts and conceded just 13 runs in his 8 overs.

Before the match, I was thinking that the Indians would drive the spinners crazy especially since they are considered good players of spin. But it turned out the other way. The players were having a puzzled look after losing their wickets. But after all the senior players - Sachin, Dravid, Laxman, Ganguly are not in the team. They were the great players of spin. The new breed of players haven't experienced much of great spin bowlers like Warne or Kumble. And there are no spin bowlers in the Indian side who have the potential to shine. Both Pakistan and Sri Lanka have found good spinning talent in Saeed Ajmal and Ajanta Mendis in the Asia Cup series. Both of them have the talent to do wonders if they are guided properly.

Now the task of Indian Team will be to find a good bowling squad. They have an exceptional batting line up which need more practice of spin. The bowling department of the side needs the much required touch up. And all of this is needed pretty fast before they lose more of these crucial matches.

It was the 18th final which they lost in a total of 22 finals. Thats pretty bad when we have a first class top-order and middle-order. Lots of mending work is to be done in the bowling department too which looks very weak compared to other teams.