by Rex Clementine

Saturday was a disaster at Eden Park in Auckland, that iconic sports venue that has been hosting Test cricket since 1930. There have been two ICC Cricket World Cup semi-finals there and a Rugby World Cup final. Eden Park is the MCG of New Zealand. The Sri Lankan team put up one of the worst batting performances in the history getting bowled out for 76 to lose by a massive 198 runs.

Remember in the last ODI that the national cricket team featured in they were shot out for 73 runs at Trivandrum in the southern Indian city to lose by a record 317 runs. That’s the worst defeat in the history of ODI cricket, not just by Sri Lanka but by any team. You wonder how the selectors survived after such a catastrophic performance.

You at least wished that they would rethink the strategy but the failed formula of basing the team on all-rounders is being continued.The idea of too many all-rounders is outdated and a failed strategy that has been long discarded by England. Sri Lankans who came up with innovate ways of playing limited overs cricket have now borrowed a leaf out of England’s book and the strategy has been recipe for disaster.

The selectors may say that Chamika Karunaratne, one of the all-rounders they backed ended up with career best figures on Saturday and yes he did but as Mr. Michael Tissera used to remind us, ‘end doesn’t justify the means’. Mr. Tissera of course was a class of his own and probably the best chief selector we had.

Both Chamika and Dasun Shanaka can not feature in the same side is an argument that most cricket enthusiasts agree on and how come the selectors don’t agree with that is the question. Surely, now that Chamika has justified his place they are not going to axe the man who won us the Asia Cup?

It is all too evident that Dasun is not a number five or a six in ODI cricket. He’s got to bat at number seven which means the top six has to be specialist batters. You can sneak in a Dhananjaya de Silva somewhere there as he gives an additional bowling option but the selectors don’t want to do that. Your all-rounder which is Dasun is at number seven and then follow your bowlers. That’s what successful Sri Lankan teams have done all these years. The current selectors are holding onto a theory of their own which has brought us nothing but disaster.

Dasun has got to bowl more if he has to remain in the ODI outfit and by not bowling he’s not doing too many favours to the team and himself.You also wonder what was the point in sending Thilina Kandamby as a specialist coach to New Zealand for the series. Can Kandamby offer you anything that Chris Silverwood can not? Or for that matter Naveed Nawaz, the batting coach.

This could be an effort to undermine Silverwood. The selectors have been doing it for sometime now. When the team won the Asia Cup, they were quick to take credit elsewhere. When things went wrong in Australia following the arrest of Danushka Gunathilaka the same selectors were doing a Pontius Pilate without owing up for their blunder of retaining an injured player.

The selectors failed policies have denied Sri Lanka a chance to automatically qualify for this year’s World Cup. Even Bangladesh and Afghanistan have gone through. This is nothing but a shame for a proud cricketing nation that won the 50 over World Cup once and reached the finals on two occasions. The current selectors flawed policies need to be kicked out together with them.