Kasun Rajitha returns home with back injury

by Rex Clementine

Sri Lanka will be without the services of fast bowler Kasun Rajitha for the second Test against Bangladesh that gets underway on Saturday in Chittagong. Rajitha was the most successful seamer as Sri Lanka won the opening Test by 328 runs inside four days.

Rajitha finished with career best figures of eight for 112 in the opening Test including a five-wicket haul in the second innings.Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) said that the fast bowler was returning home due to a back injury.

Rajitha has been primarily used for Test match cricket by the new selection panel and he hadn’t played in any white ball cricket this year. His absence is a blow for Sri Lanka but the good news is that Asitha Fernando has been flown in as replacement.

Chamika Gunasekara is already a part of the squad and it remains to be seen whether Asitha gets the nod to play ahead of Gunasekera.

Asitha Fernando would have been the first pick among Sri Lanka’s quicks but at the time of the selections he was unavailable having suffered a hamstring injury. He was initially thought to be out of the series but has recovered sufficiently.

Asitha was the hero for Sri Lanka when they won a Test series in Bangladesh last time. After the first Test was drawn, Asitha claimed a match bag of ten for 144 in the second Test in Dhaka in 2022 to help Sri Lanka to a ten-wicket win.

Bangladesh were well set at 156 for five but were bowled out for 169 as they lost the last five wickets for just 13 runs. The specialty of Asitha is that when the ball gets older and the wicket gets flatter, he runs in and troubles the batters reverse swinging the older ball to deadly effect. His bouncers are also quite unsettling to the batters and he’s emerging as a leading fast bowler in the world.

Sri Lanka’s fast bowlers have struggled with injuries in recent times and in a year where there is lot of cricket, they need their quicks firing on all cylinders.

This year Sri Lanka will play Test matches in England and South Africa apart from hosting New Zealand at home. There’s also the T-20 World Cup in the United States and the Caribbean in June.

In a bid to address the injury concerns, Sri Lanka have roped in reputed physiotherapist Jonathan Porter, who had been working with the Australian team. The recruitment had been done on the recommendations of Alex Kountouris, the former physiotherapist of the national cricket team.