'We did not play quality cricket' - Kumble

After surrendering the series to a clinical Sri Lankan outfit, India have to face up to and deal with the sour truth that they only won one session of this game. Left to rummage through the remains of yet another overseas series squandered after a memorable comeback, Anil Kumble, India's captain, had few positives to pick out.

"We missed out on a good opportunity to beat Sri Lanka," Kumble said. "We did really well in Galle to come back and we did not capitalise on the winning of the toss here. You cannot lose five wickets in the first 40 overs of a Test. That happened to us quite regularly in this series which is something we need to think about."

With a hundred more runs in the first innings the outcome of this match could have been different. However, India's famed middle order failed again - twice. Chaminda Vaas again went wicketless and Muttiah Muralitharan was nowhere near his best, but Dammika Prasad and Ajantha Mendis bowled with guile and accuracy to rock the boat. That spelt the death knell for India, Kumar Sangakkara's match-winning hundred boarded up the coffin, and Ajantha Mendis and Murali returned to hammer in the nails.

"For a new batter to go straightway and face two spinners it is never easy," Kumble said. "People who got starts, if they had converted it would have been a different story. I do not want to give excuses. Overall we did not play quality cricket to win the series."

India's inconsistency ultimately proved pivotal. In Galle, India were 167 for 0 and lost four wickets in a post rain-interval passage; a similar story unfolded in the second innings. At the PSS Virender Sehwag and Gautam Gambhir, India's success stories with the bat, threw it away in the second innings when the demand was solidity.

This was also arguably the worst series for India's famed middle order. Sachin Tendulkar looked a shadow of himself in scratching 95 runs at 15.83 and Sourav Ganguly, who batted so brilliantly against South Africa at Ahmedabad and Kanpur in his last series, was a phantom in Sri Lanka, making 96 runs. Rahul Dravid's tentativeness at the crease this series has betrayed a tinge of insecurity, and VVS Laxman managed just two fifties, out five times to Mendis.

"It is not just one or two players [who we should blame]," Kumble said. "It is important that everyone contributes. I do not think there was enough contribution throughout the series from the middle order consistently. Even the lower order did not contribute consistently except one game here. That is obviously something that let us down."

Harbhajan Singh and Ishant Sharma turned in match-winning performances in Galle but otherwise there was little to speak of in the bowling department. Except for Harbhajan, who took 16 wickets, no bowler averaged less than 30. Kumble, India's highest wicket-taker ever, had a series to forget. His eight wickets at 50.00 was his worst three-match series since India played Pakistan in 2006. "I take responsibility," he said, before quickly opting to take the clichéd route, "but the bowlers put their hearts in."

The saving grace of defeat is that it invariably brings lessons. As Kumble pointed out, India have a month-and-a-half to think about what needs to be done before a four-Test series against Australia. "That's still a lot of time for us to think and reflect on what went wrong," Kumble said. India's time starts now..