India enter Asian Games final after Kishan and Bumrah ride roughshod over Sri Lanka

Defending champions India registered their biggest T20I win against Sri Lanka to make the final of the 2026 Asian Games men's competition in Nisshin on Thursday.

A day after the ODI side chased down 406 against West Indies like it was child's play on a flat Guwahati pitch, the T20I side scraped their way to 169, well above-par on a treacherous track filled with cracks. Sri Lanka were no match after that.

The result sets up the first India vs Pakistan final of 2026, and there will be a gold medal at stake.

Sri Lanka were a touch unlucky as Ishan Kishan miscued many aerial shots but they all fell in no-man's land. But Nuwanidu Fernando did drop Kishan on 56, and that didn't help as he went on to make 80* in just 46 balls. There were a couple of balls that misbehaved wildly, and it was a sign of things to come.

The chase felt like an act of cruelty against batters. Jasprit Bumrah bowled Test lengths and added new degrees of unplayability to the existing ones. Axar Patel bowled 14 dots and got a two-for and India finished the game with a team hat-trick. On top of all that, Sri Lanka suffered three run outs, two of which were of top-four batters.

In the end, they were rolled over for 45, the second-lowest total in men's games at the Asian Games and the joint-lowest total for a Full-Member team in men's T20Is, alongside West Indies' 45 against England in 2019.