"India plays on good wickets and small boundaries"- Maheesh Theekshana destroys Rohit Sharma and Co.

Sri Lanka spinner Maheesh Theekshana opened up on his team's game plan for India that helped them win the ODI series. Theekshana did not play in the first two games of the series but played in the third ODI. He returned with figures of 2-45, which included the wickets of Rishabh Pant and Washington Sundar.

The Sri Lankan spinners were all over India throughout the ODI series. On pitches offering a substantial amount of turn, the star-studded Indian batting line-up was all at sea except the captain Rohit Sharma.

Rohit consistently gave India terrific starts at the top and scored runs at a brisk pace. But the other batters failed to carry on the momentum and lost wickets in clusters to help Sri Lanka gain the upper hand in all three matches.

Watch: Riyan Parag suffers brain-fade moment as Jeffrey Vandersay stuns him and rattles the stumps

Maheesh Theekshana reveals Sri Lanka's gameplan against India

While speaking at the post-match press conference, Maheesh Theekshana revealed how Sri Lanka made a terrific comeback from the T20I series loss. He added that the team used the defeat in the Sri Lanka series as a motivation to win the ODIs.

"For me, it's a confidence booster as a team. We lost the T20 series 3-0. The whole team was disappointed and we took it as a motivation. Very happy to play the last game and win the series after 1997. It's a huge victory for us and I am really proud to be part of the XI," Theekshana said.

Theekshana also revealed his team's game plan to India's batters by mentioning that the Indian batters are used to playing on good batting wickets and small boundaries. He further added that the plan was to use the spin-friendly surface at R. Premadasa Stadium to good effect.

"They usually play on good wickets" - Maheesh Theekshana

"They (India) usually play on good wickets and small boundaries in India. We knew playing in Premadasa, if there's little bit turn, we can take advantage because we have good spinners," the 24-year-old added.

India's struggle against spin was exposed by Sri Lanka in this series. In the first ODI, Sri Lanka's spinners accounted for 9 wickets in total as Wanindu Hasaranga and skipper Charith Asalanka picked up three wickets each.

Legspinner Jeffrey Vandersay wreaked havoc in the second ODI with 6-33 while Charith Asalanka again chipped in with 3 wickets, making it 9 wickets to spin in this game as well.

In the third match, the story was almost the same but Sri Lankan spinners were even more penetrative this time. Left-arm spinner Dunith Wellalage picked up a five-wicket haul while the other spinners Maheesh Theekshana and Jeffrey Vandersay took two wickets each. Overall, Sri Lanka's spinners took 27 out of 30 wickets on offer this ODI series.

Maheesh Theekshana lauds Sri Lankan spinners

Meanwhile, Maheesh Theekshana also lauded his teammates for keeping on the pressure on India's batters helping the team claim a memorable series win.

“Rohit came into bat and he attacked me, Asitha got a good start, came back and got Shubman, and then Wellalage was brilliant, Vandersay did a great job ... Hasaranga in the first game, Akila bowled economically in both the games. I wanted to bowl more dot balls. It was a team effort. All the players contributed, that's why we ended up winning 2-0,” said Theekshana.

Sri Lanka bowled out India for just 138 runs to win the match by 110 runs. This was Sri Lanka's first bilateral series win over India in 27 years. They last won a bilateral series over India way back in 1997.