Robin Uthappa on way to his 41-ball 70 in Chennai on Saturday. (AP)

Chennai: Did the flat Chepauk strip miss the in-form Sourav Ganguly?

The West Indies captain, Brian Lara, may be the right person to give an honest answer to the question.

At one point, Lara & Co were staring at a 350-plus target when Robin Uthappa, Sachin Tendulkar and Rahul Dravid were firing on all cylinders in the third Pepsi Cup one-dayer at the MA Chidambaram (MAC) Stadium on Saturday.

In a dramatic turn around, Team India (minus Sourav) collapsed for 268 and the visitors hunted down the target in just 43.4 overs, losing seven wickets in the process.

Notching up his best at MAC, Lara (with Man-of-the-Match Marlon Samuels, 98) gave his team a three-wicket win to make it 1-2 in the four-match series. Lara, at 75, eclipsed his previous best (74) against India in 1994-95.

The West Indies captain scored 83 before being taken by Uthappa off Powar (in his second spell), but the ship had already reached the destination (with the equation reading 12 runs off 54 balls).

Consider this: For India, going almost nine runs per over at one stage (90 runs off 10 overs with Uthappa at the crease), the top five scored 237 runs, while the remaining six managed only 31 and were bowled out inside 10.5 overs.

The ‘infamous six’ included comeback-man Yuvraj Singh (back after a three-month injury hiatus), Cuttack-hero Dinesh Karthik, Ajit Agarkar, Powar, Kumble and Sreesanth.

Kumble, though, remained undefeated.

The win, by the way, overshadowed Uthappa’s brilliance earlier in the day.

Hailing from the Kodava community (Coorgs), known for their flair to martial arts and hockey, Uthappa showed stickwork (read: willow work), to live up to the expectations of Dilip Vengsarkar & Co., who chose to give “rest” to in-form Sourav, along with three others (Zaheer Khan, Mahendra Singh Dhoni and Harbhajan Singh).

Len Aiyappa, Venu Utthappa are the better known hockey players from the south Indian community. They were also designated as the ‘martial race’ by the British for their courage and grit.

The Kodava bugle was heard not only around Chennai and the regions of Bangalore — where they are concentrated with numbering around 5 lakhs — but all over. Son of hockey player-turned-umpire Venu, Uthappa junior showed that he really has ‘hockey’ in his genes.

Every time Uthappa fired, he placed it almost miraculously among fielders during his spotless innings of 70 runs — his second best from four ODIs.

His highest — 86 — was in his debut against England in Indore (2005-06).

Uthappa showed he has a wide range of shots in his armoury. From straight drives to flicks to pull, Uthappa’s fireworks, for a moment, made everybody feel that the opening slot was not missing Virender Sehwag.

With seven fours and two sixes, he kept the fielders on toes and did not allow debutant Rayad Emrit to settle down.The blessings of Satya Sai Baba seems to have worked for Sachin, who came in at No. 4. He notched up his 75th fifty (11th against the West Indies), alongside Rahul Dravid (who also made his 75th fifty, seventh against the West Indies).

Incidentally, during his 112-minute, 66-ball stay, Sachin got two lives: If Denesh Ramdin missed one stumping off Gayle in the 25th over, skipper Brian Lara dropped him at short mid-wicket in the 33rd over when the ball kissed his fingers.

Chepauk, by the way, is Sachin’s “favourite” ground. The 45,000-strong crowd, obviously, knew it as they gave Sachin a thunderous applause when he scored his first run — a single — in the third ball he faced.

After Sachin’s departure, the last five could add only 13 runs as Dwyane Bravo came up with his best figures: 9-0-39-4.