5 most memorable India-Sri Lanka ODIs in history

#1 1st ODI, Sri Lanka tour of India at Rajkot, Dec 15, 2009

Brief Scores: India 414/7; Sri Lanka411/8 (50 overs)

Result: India won by 3 runs

Sehwag's blistering knock helped India post a mammoth total but it was far from comfortable for the hosts

The opening match of the 5-match ODI series between India and Sri Lanka turned out to be a high-scoring nail-biter in which the hosts only managed to scrape through narrowly despite scoring a mammoth total of 414 in their 50 overs.

Put into bat by Sri Lanka, India made a quick-fire start with the opening duo on Sachin Tendulkar and Virender Sehwag firing on all cylinders. The latter eventually went on to score 146 off just 102 balls while Tendulkar and MS Dhoni scored 69 and 72 respectively.

A late flourish from Virat Kohli and Ravindra Jadeja saw India cross the 400-run mark and it seemed like the game was all done and dusted at the half-way mark.

However, Sri Lanka were not going to give in without a fight and skipper Kumar Sangakkara led from the front with a 43-ball 90 and along with Tillakaratne Dilshan, who scored 160 off just 124 balls and Upul Tharanga, who scored 67 off 60 balls, the visitors had their noses well and truly in front having crossed the 300-run mark in the 36th over.

Sri Lanka lost the trio of Sanath Jayasuriya, Dilshan and Mahela Jayawardene in quick intervals but still kept their scoring rate high and at one stage required just 32 of 5 overs to win the match.

With 5 wickets in hand, it seemed an easily achievable task but the hosts made a remarkable turnaround with the left-arm duo of Zaheer Khan and Ashish Nehra bringing all their experience into play to put a stranglehold on the Sri Lankan scoring and aided by a couple of run-outs in the 49th over, India eventually ended up winning the contest by a margin of 3 runs.

The 2nd ODI of the series also went all the way down to the wire, but this time, it was the visitors who triumphed, chasing down the target of 302 with 5 balls remaining and three wickets in hand.