Watch: Kumar Sangakkara rings the bell at Eden Gardens

Former Sri Lankan cricketer Kumar Sangakkara did the honour of ringing the bell at Eden Gardens, Kolkata before the start of India vs Sri Lanka 2nd ODI on Thursday. As per the tradition at the iconic venue, since 2016, the bell is rung by a noted player of the game five minutes before the match is scheduled to start.

India’s 1983 World Cup-winning captain Kapil Dev was the first to ring the bell at the venue while in the past Sourav Ganguly, Rahul Dravid among other cricketers have done the honours as well. Non-cricket icons Viswanathan Anand, Magnus Carlsen, Mamata Banerjee among others have also been part of the tradition in the past.

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Eden Gardens, managed by Cricket Association of Bengal, picked the tradition from Lord’s Cricket Ground, known as the ‘Mecca of cricket’, who started the tradition first in 2007.

In the game, Sri Lanka captain Dasun Shanaka opted to bat first after winning the toss. The captain made two changes to their playing XI with opener Nuwanidu Fernando handed debut cap while Lahiru Kumara came in as well. Both replaced Pathum Nissanka and Dilshan Madushanka respectively as the duo is injured.

India made only once change in the line-up as Kuldeep Yadav replaced fellow spinner Yuzvendra Chahal in the line-up as the latter failed to recover from a knock from the last game.

At the time of writing, Sri Lanka were 191/8 in 38.1 overs as the Sri Lankan batting order collapsed despite getting a good start from Nuwanidu’s 50 on debut. The wrecker in chiefs were Indian spin duo of Kuldeep Yadav and Axar Patel, who combined to take five wickets seven overs to break the visitors’ backbone.

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