Virtually chanceless centuries from Virat Kohli and Gautam Gambhir made sure they would go to their home ground, Feroz Shah Kotla, with the series in the bag. The ease with which they chased down 316 in 48.1 overs, with Virender Sehwag and Sachin Tendulkar out inside the first four overs, and the absences of MS Dhoni and Yuvraj Singh for this match, was remarkable. On a day that youngsters outshone the more familiar performers in the series, Upul Tharanga's first ODI century in 53 innings and more than three years, along with Suranga Lakmal's opening burst finished second-best to the 224-run partnership between the Delhi batsmen.

The Sri Lankan spinners were hampered by the dew, and were not helped by the ease with which the Indian batsmen kept alternating the strike. Kumar Sangakkara's strategy to sit and wait for a mistake in the middle overs confounded equally. Of the 224 runs that Kohli and Gambhir added, they ran 125. As a result, they were not forced to take risks, neither did the required run-rate ever go over 6.7.

That had little bearing on how well Kohli - who scored his maiden international century - and Gambhir played. The main features of Kohli's innings were the flicks into the leg side, and punches off the back foot. Gambhir looked to run the ball off the face of the bat, place it into gaps for couples, and he also made sure he was there till the end.

Lakmal would have happily settled with Sehwag and Tendulkar as his first two international wickets, within seven deliveries and before either batsman had settled down, had Kohli and Gambhir not staged the comeback. Neither batsmen needed to take the aerial route. The only element of risk was Kohli's moving across the stumps, but his bat kept coming down at the right time.

Debutant Thissara Perera went for 28 in his four overs, and was replaced by Lasith Malinga, who helped in opening the floodgates. Kohli flicked him for two boundaries on the leg side, and crashed him through the off side for two more, off consecutive deliveries in his first over. After nine overs, India had galloped along to 70, and Kohli to 26 off 22.

Lakmal continued to get the odd ball to rise awkwardly, but he lacked support from the other end. And once India's run-rate went above the required rate, both the batsmen settled down into milking mode and waited for the loose balls, which Malinga kept providing India with.

With spin came signs that the dew would have an effect on the remainder of the match. In his second over, Suraj Randiv bowled a lob down the leg side, and Kohli took advantage. The boundary again took India ahead of the required rate, and in the next couple of overs both the batsmen reached their fifties.

They cruised towards their centuries, but not before Kohli presented Sri Lanka with the only glimpse of opportunity. He had reached 88, and India 207 for 2 in 33 overs, when he nicked the first ball from Tillakaratne Dilshan. Sangakkara, though, couldn't hold on to a tough chance. The two batsmen then reached their respective centuries mirroring each other - moving from 99 to 100 in consecutive deliveries. In what was the definitive tale of the innings, both got those singles with only four fielders inside the circle.

The century attained, Kohli holed out to long-on, trying to finish off the game early, but Gambhir made sure there were no further mishaps, scoring 47 off the 70 remaining runs.

Tharanga was made to work harder for his seventh century earlier in the day. For the first time in the series, India came out with an effective plan to keep Tharanga and Dilshan quiet in the opening overs. Both Zaheer and Nehra kept two men on the leg-side boundary for Dilshan, the third man was left vacant, but no room was given and neither was he offered anything to drive.

As a result, India managed their first maiden of the series - bowled by Nehra - and not one boundary was conceded in the first five overs. In the first three matches, Sri Lanka reached their 50 in 3.4 overs, 6.3 overs, and 7.2 overs. At those various stages, Sri Lanka had scored 6 for 0, 23 for 0 and 24 for 0 today.

Dilshan fell into the trap and pulled Nehra low to Kohli at fine leg, but in one swift act of acceleration, and solid consolidation thereafter, Tharanga almost single-handedly undid India's improved effort.

India's fielding was a huge improvement over their earlier efforts, but they still dropped Tharanga and Kumar Sangakkara. That cost them 171 runs, and left them chasing 300-plus - a total that did scant justice to the efforts of Zaheer and Nehra who took 4 for 117 between them.

Like Malinga with Kohli later in the match, Ishant Sharma provided Tharanga with the release and the momentum in the 12th over. Ishant provided him driving length, and also width, and was punished with five boundaries in his first over. All of a sudden, Tharanga was 45 off 43 balls.

A period of consolidation followed, and Tharanga and Sangakkara added 126 runs in 23.4 overs without any concern. After Sangakkara's dismissal, and Tharanga's soon after, Perera stunned India with 31 off 14 balls, but Zaheer and Nehra came back well to ensure the damage done was not beyond repair

It is not often that a player draws flak for scoring the winning runs but India's wicketkeeper-batsman Dinesh Karthik clearly has not made himself popular by leaving Sachin Tendulkar stranded just four runs short of a century in the third ODI against Sri Lanka.

India won the third one-dayer comfortably in Cuttack on Monday night but an over-zealous Karthik finds himself at the centre of a debate on whether he should have allowed his senior partner Tendulkar to complete what could have been his 46th ODI century.

Former cricketers reckoned that Karthik could have given more strike to Tendulkar since there were still some overs left but were not willing to be too harsh on the young keeper whose priority was to take India to victory.

"Karthik's not mature enough. He could have given more strike to Tendulkar to complete a well-deserved hundred. Karthik was too excited to finish off the game himself," former India spinner Bapu Nadkarni said.

Karthik (32 not out), filling in for regular captain and stumper Mahendra Singh Dhoni who is serving a two-match suspension, hit the winning runs - a four - to leave his illustrious partner stranded at an unbeaten 96 in a team total of 242 for three.

Nadkarni wondered why Karthik went for a six the over before the target was achieved.

"What was the need for that shot at that stage?" wondered Nadkarni, who was known for his accuracy in bowling.

He was referring to the Tamil Nadu player stepping out to rookie off spinner Suraj Randiv and lofting the bowler over the long-on fence in the 42nd over that brought down the target.

Tendulkar hit a four off Lasith Malinga, bowling the 43rd over, when India needed seven to overhaul Sri Lanka's modest total of 239 and then got a single to third man to give the strike to Karthik.

Karthik played out a dot ball before glancing the sling-arm action bowler for a four off the fourth ball to leave India victors with more than seven overs to spare.

Another former Test player Chandu Borde felt it was not deliberate on the youngster's part to deny Tendulkar his coveted three-figure mark in his 439th ODI.

"It would have been good if Tendulkar had scored a century. Karthik did it in his excitement, I presume. It was due to inexperience and was not deliberate. Such things happen in one's excitement to reach the target," Borde added.

Former Indian captain and batting great Sunil Gavaskar said Tendulkar should have accelerated the pace of scoring when he was in the 80s.

"You don't want to miss a hundred whatever age you are and I think this is where it brings glory to the team, to the individual and to the country", Gavaskar said.

"May be he should have gone a little more aggressive at that stage and got to the hundred. When he was in the 80s, he should have taken the batting powerplay because that would have allowed him to go over the top and get to the hundred," Gavaskar said.

Another former India player Abbas Ali Baig felt that Karthik could have given the strike to Tendulkar but cricket was a team game and such things do happen.

"It is always good if your teammate can hit a century. I am quite sure that Dinesh must have gone and asked his senior partner Tendulkar, who must have told him to play his game and not bother about individual milestones."

"It looked pretty obvious that they were wanting to finish off the game. Tendulkar was unselfish and didn't ask Dinesh to give him the strike to complete his century. Many people have often said that Tendulkar plays for records, but this proves that he is totally unselfish and plays for the team," Baig said.

Former Indian opener Chetan Chauhan also felt that Tendulkar deserved to get his century but was not willing to be harsh on Karthik.

"It would have been better for Dinesh to give the strike to Tendulkar to complete the century. There were lots of overs left in the game but you cannot blame Dinesh or any other player for such situations", Chauhan said.

"All the players are involved in winning the match and that was their main target. They don't think of any individual performance much. Dinesh must be focussing on winning the match," Chauhan said.

Former India stumper Syed Kirmani said it was the duty of the coach to send a message to the batsmen. "It is mainly the duty of the coach to send in a message to the batsmen at the middle. This is generally done though the batsmen monitor as to what their and the team's scores are. Tendulkar did go over to Dinesh and said something when he was in his 90s. I don't know what was discussed...There is a possibility that Sachin would have told Karthik that now that Dhoni is not around, and since you have replaced him for two matches, you should remain unbeaten. Both remained unbeaten finally."

"To me, only these two players concerned will know what transpired. Karthik hit a six and at that time Sachin walked up to him and said something. Dinesh nodded his head. From then on, both were not going for big runs but took singles and twos," Kirmani said.

Cuttack: Stand-in Indian captain Virender Sehwag said he feared at one stage that Sri Lanka would score 350 in the third one-dayer here on Monday and gave full credit to his bowlers for bringing the home team back into the game with a disciplined effort.

"At one stage, I thought Sri Lanka would score 350-400 the way they were going. But Ashish Nehra bowled well in the powerplay and then Ravindra Jadeja and Harbhajan Singh took over to change the game. They kept the ball slow and low," Sehwag said after India's seven-wicket victory to take a 2-1 lead in the five-match series.

"At one time Sri Lankans were 165 for one and our bowlers did a terrific job to bring us back into the game. They took wickets at crucial moments. Full credit goes to them," he added.

Sehwag lavished praise on Jadeja, who produced his career-best 4 for 32, for turning the game in favour of India.

"When Jadeja took over, the game changed a lot and he bowled really well. He brought us back into the game after the Lankans were going great guns. He also bowled economically giving away just 32 runs from his 10 overs and took four wickets," said the Delhi dasher.

He also gave credit to his batsmen for capitalising on the good show by the bowlers and praise Tendulkar in particular.

"We began well and I utilised the first few overs well before Sachin (Tendulkar) took over. He batted really well to take us through," Sehwag said.