India did the damage upfront: Atapattu

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Sri Lankan captain Marvan Atapattu admitted that the swashbuckling batting by Sachin Tendulkar and Irfan Pathan in the early overs took the game away from his team.

"The Indian batsman did well. It is hard to contain Tendulkar when he is in full flow, and Pathan also played well. They did the damage upfront," Atapattu said, after losing the first one-day international to India by 152 runs, at the VCA stadium in Nagpur, on Tuesday.

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This was Sri Lanka's third match at the Vidarbha Cricket Association stadium, but the visitors went back empty-handed yet again.

After India set a huge target of 350 for 6 in their 50 overs, the Sri Lankans never looked like getting back in the contest, especially after the loss of a few early wickets, on a pitch that offered a lot more assistance to the spinners in the second half of the match.

"We lost wickets early which didn't help. It was a good wicket to bat on, but it turned a bit later on," he said.

Asked what would have been a good target, Atapattu replied: "325 would have been a good score for us with wickets in hand."

He said the team would now try and improve upon their performance, which has seen them lose two straight matches.

On Saturday, the visitors went down to Mumbai Cricket Association President's XI in a warm-up match in Mumbai.

"We will try to do something about our mistakes and hope that we won't repeat it," the Sri Lanka skipper added.

The teams now head to Mohali for the second one-day international, on October 28.