Ganguly hits 50th six in home series

Statistical Highlights, India v Sri Lanka, Rajkot ODI

  -         In last 10 overs India needed just 45 runs to win with five wickets remaining and in last 5 they needed only 24 with 5 wickets standing, still they managed to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory!

-         The five-run victory for Sri Lanka is their second narrowest against India after their two-run win at Colombo SSC in 1997-98.

-         The five-run defeat is also India's fifth narrowest at home soil. The details:

-         Munaf Patel (4-49) achieved best figures of his ODI career. His previous best was 3-18 against England in an ICC Champions Trophy game at Jaipur in October 2006.

-         The 100-run partnership between Sourav Ganguly and Sachin Tendulkar was the 21st century partnership between this pair -- more than any other pair in ODI history. Of these 16 have come for the first wicket, three for second and two for the third wicket. The only other century partnership between this pair for third wicket was 127 also against Sri Lanka at Colombo SSC in 1999-00.

-         Tendulkar's 54 was his 21st fifty-plus score against Sri Lanka -- yet another record. He was previously at level with Pakistan's Saeed Anwar.

-         The six that Sourav Ganguly hit over the bowler Kulasekara's head was his 50th on Indian soil. Before this match both Ganguly and Tendulkar were levelled with 49 sixes on Indian soil from 64 and 124 innings respectively. Ganguly however won the race and became the first batsman to hit 50 sixes on Indian soil. Ganguly also is only the second batsman to hit 50 sixes in any country after New Zealand's Chris Cairns, who has hit 60 sixes in 79 innings in New Zealand.

-         Kumar Sangakkara (110) scored sixth hundred of his ODI career in his 187th match -- his second in 25 games against India.

-         Tillakaratne Dilshan (56) completed his 2,000 runs in one-day internationals when his score reached 34. He became 12th Sri Lankan to reach this milestone. Dilshan was playing his 107th match and 89th innings.

-         The fifth wicket partnership of 108 runs between Sangakkara and Dilshan is the highest ever for this wicket position at Rajkot. The pair obliterated the 66-run partnership between Asanka Gurusinha and Arjuna Ranatunga against India in 1989-90.

-         Sangakkara reached his hundred with a six off Kumble (moving from 97 to 103). He became only the third Sri Lankan to reach his hundred with a six. Others to do so for Sri Lanka are Aravinda de Silva (v Zimbabwe, Harare, 1994-95) and Sanath Jayasuriya (v New Zealand at Sharjah in 2000-01 and also at Napier in 2006-07).

-         Sangakkara's innings included four sixes. With this he equalled Sanath Jayasuriya's Sri Lankan record of hitting maximum sixes in an innings on Indian soil. Jayasuriya had also done so against India at Mumbai in 1996-97.

-         Sangakkara won his 11th Man of the Match award -- his first against India.