Thursday, August 21 2008 -- The second ODI of the 5 match One day International series between India and Sri Lanka was played on 20th August 21, 2008 at the Dambulla Stadium.

The hosts, Sri Lanka had already won the test series and were leading the ongoing ODI series by a win. Indian captain MS Dhoni put the Sri Lankan team to bat after winning the toss. He said that he chose to "bowl out of compulsion" even with a pitch that seemed good for batting due to the injuries that the Indian batting lineup had incurred. Zaheer Khan answered his captain’s call by claiming 3 quick wickets dismissing Sangakkara, Jayawardene and Kapugedera and leaving Sri Lanka at 10 runs for 3 wickets. Praveen Kumar and Harbhajan Singh kept the pressure claiming 3 and 2 wickets each and restricted the Sri Lankans to a score of 142 runs in 38.3 overs. Despite a seemingly simple target the Indian batsmen stumbled to the Sri Lankan pacers Kulasekara and Thushara as Irfan Pathan and Suresh Raina lost their wickets for single digit runs. It was the skipper himself who came to the rescue and played a stable 39 runs to help India reach somewhere near the target at 135 runs. After almost throwing away the game in typical fashion at the last minute when the last recognized potential scorer Harbhajan Singh got out at jus one run, it was the debutant S Badrinath and bowler Zaheer Khan that took India past the target with Badrinath playing a sensible and level headed 27 runs. The Man of the Match was awarded to Zaheer Khan who took 4 wickets and gave away just 21 runs.

Dhoni who appreciated Badrinath’s calmness said, “It was Badrinath's first game and he had the pressure of scoring. That's what gives you confidence and the more experience you get the better. You don't need to play 100 games for that. Even 25 such games will give you much more experience. The more you are in these conditions, the more comfortable you will be in the future. It is good preparation, but it takes its toll too. You need to really concentrate”

Dhoni also agreed that there was a lot of pressure on the team and said, “We needed to win before we went to Premadasa for the remainder of the series. There was lot of pressure on us, but Zaheer did the job for us. We would have loved to win comfortably, but nevertheless we would take this”