Sri Lanka’s World Cup campaign in shambles

Rex Clementine in Hyderabad

Most fans back home are angry and disappointed at the start the Sri Lankan team has had in this World Cup campaign. In Delhi, they concede the most runs scored in a World Cup game in history and three days later in Hyderabad, they let the opposition to chase down the highest target in World Cup history. Our bowling is awful. Our cricket is pathetic. A team that set high standards in cricket two decades ago has become the laughing stock.

Let’s be realistic. Given the fact that you have just four players who had featured in World Cups before and your team had to qualify for the sport’s showpiece event, you have got to be happy if they beat Bangladesh, Afghanistan and Netherlands. Any other win has to be a bonus. The only upsets Sri Lanka could create was against South Africa and Pakistan on recent form.

However, now those two games are over, Sri Lanka is facing a tall order in the 2023 campaign.

This year, Sri Lanka suffered their worst ODI defeat in Trivandrum when they lost to India by 317 runs. This year, Sri Lanka suffered their worst ever Test defeat at home when Pakistan beat them by an innings and 222 runs. This year Sri Lanka were also bowled out for their lowest total at home – 50 – in the Asia Cup final.

There are too many lows this year and the list seems to be only growing. We need to address the issue now or face more embarrassment as we move on. There is every indication that Sri Lankan cricket is heading the same direction as West Indies cricket. Woe be the day if that happens.

Teams like India, New Zealand, England and Australia have taken their game to new levels whereas we are happy that we enjoyed a record winning streak, most of which came against associate nations like UAE, Scotland and Oman.

The fact that all these record defeats have happened under the same selection panel means there is an urgent need to get a new set of selectors who are firm but fair. The current panel made a hue and cry about fitness standards and made several players ineligible for selection. Once they got rid of half a dozen seniors, the rules changed. Now they play by a different set of rules, and you don’t become ineligible for selection if your fitness standards aren’t up to scratch.

There are serious questions about our High-Performance  Center. Are we preparing players for the requirements of high intensity of international cricket?

How can your premier fast bowler send down 13 wides one day and 18 wides three days later?  That too in a World Cup!

Our fielding that used to be the best in the region and on par with Australia and South Africa is crap at the moment. We end up paying princely sums to hire foreign coaches to improve fielding whereas someone like Upul Chandana, under whose watch the under-19 team has maintained high fielding standards, is wasting his time with development squads.

So much has been said about the standards of our domestic cricket. In 2017, we doubled the teams that play First Class cricket to 26 in order to please cricket’s voter base. A few years down the line we realized that it was a mistake and were keen to address the issue and a system was introduced to cut down the number of First-Class teams methodically. But that structure seems to have been thrown out of the window because you don’t want to antagonize your voter base.

Even our former captains who had championed the cause of domestic cricket and wanted teams to be cut down have been silenced with solid pay packages.

The injuries to our players are legendary. During the last T-20 World Cup in Australia, the team management promised to address the issue, but they have done precious little to overcome the problem. Our training methods and our rehabilitation need to be looked at.

Our wickets are horrible. In slow turners back home, we could give any team a run for their money, but we seem to forget that when we go for ICC events, we get belters. Having played on poor quality wickets, our bowlers are not up to the mark on flat decks and have no idea how to stop the run flow.

Forget international cricket. Even for Lanka Premier League we failed to produce decent wickets and they were played on lousy wickets. Some say that the national curator is picked not on merit but on how many votes he has. If that’s your yardstick, then good luck to your cricket.

If you don’t have any good curators, hire someone who is capable of producing good wickets from overseas for after all you have reached record profits and you are richer than the New Zealand Cricket Board.

These are some of the harsh realities that are facing our cricket. We need to address them, now. Unless we do that, our cricket is doomed. Now then, don’t shoot the messenger.