by Rex Clementine

At times you wonder whether the reason for our cricket to suffer setbacks is lack of talent or poor man management. Take the case of Pathum Nissanka. He scores a Test hundred on debut, that too overseas and has notched up five more half-centuries in nine Tests and then was sidelined fearing a back injury might flare up. Even when he has regained full fitness, he has failed to find a place in the side.

When Mahela Jayawardene was Sri Lanka’s captain, he had an interesting theory. If a player had gone out of the side due to injury, when he returned, he could regain his place automatically although his replacement had done quite well. MJ, brilliant brain he is, but his theories aren’t always consistent.

Marvan Atapattu, MJ’s predecessor had gone out of the side with injury and when he returned not only was the captaincy snatched away from him, but he was even made to be the waterboy during the entire 2007 World Cup. In MJ, beneath the softspoken gent, lies a ruthless mastermind.If Marvan, from the cricketing royalty of Ananda and SSC, can suffer such a fate, Pathum Nissanka, from the rural Kalutara, is a nobody.

Rather than being stubborn, Pathum should do a Kusal Mendis – switch to SSC and you’ll get your dues. Since his shift to SSC, Kusal has had a suspension reduced, given the vice-captaincy of the ODI team and has become undroppable across all three formats.

It’s true that NCC looked after Pathum during his days of struggle. But the trend in modern society is to kick the ladder that helped you go places. Pathum can learn a few things from Kusal. There’s no point in blaming MJ for the selectors’ actions, some may argue. The selectors – with all respect to Rumesh Kaluwitharana – are mere puppets on a string. MJ is the alpha and omega of cricket.

Asitha Fernando, who missed the first Test as he was recovering from dengue has been added to the squad and he is expected to feature in today’s second Test. His absence was felt in Galle as Asitha is an expert of bowling with the older ball.

SSC is hosting a Test match for the first time since 2018.Head Coach Chris Silverwood expected imprvements in all three departments from his team after the four wicket loss in Galle.

“I have pushed them harder during training. There are certain areas we need to improve on and fielding is one of that. If you analyze the last Test we fell short in all three departments and that’s a concern,” Silverwood said.

Pakistan Head Coach Grant Bradburn spoke about his team’s dream of becoming world’s number one ranked side. “We want to keep improving our skills. We are growing all the time. We want to be number one in the world and to do that we want to have players in the top ten ranks for bowlers and batters. We are very happy with the way we played in Galle. Now that chapter is over. This venue is a different examination.”

Sri Lanka (From)

Dimuth Karunaratne (Captain), Nishan Madushka, Kusal Mendis, Angelo Mathews, Dinesh Chandimal, Dhananjaya de Silva, Sadeera Samarawickrama (wicketkeeper), Ramesh Mendis, Prabath Jayasuriya, Kasun Rajitha, Vishwa Fernando, Kamindu Mendis, Pathum Nissanka, Praveen Jayawickrama, Dilshan Madushanka, Lakshitha Manasinghe and Asitha Fernando.

Pakistan (From)

Babar Azam (Captain), Mohammad Rizwan (wicketkeeper), Aamer Jamal, Abdullah Shafique, Abrar Ahmed, Hasan Ali, Imam-ul-Haq, Mohammad Hurraira, Mohammad Nawaz, Naseem Shah, Noman Ali, Agha Salman, Sarfaraz Ahmed (wicketkeeper), Saud Shakeel, Shaheen Shah Afridi and Shan Masood.

Umpires: Alex Wharf (Eng) and Chris Gaffaney (NZ)

Television Umpire : Rod Tucker (Aus)

Match Referee: David Boon (Aus)