Sports
Wanindu does a Botham
By Rex Clementine
Some of the biggest stars of cricket have been flops as captains. Names like Ian Botham, Sachin Tendulkar, Inzamam-ul-Haq and Lasith Malinga were spectacular failures as captains. In sports, in general, a player’s seniority brings him the captaincy. But cricket is different. Captaining a cricket team is not merely walking in for a coin toss. It involves much more. It’s a tactical game. In most sports, coaches make the call. In cricket, captains make the call on the field of play. That’s why your best brain has to lead the side and not your best player. Sadly, in our part of the world, we do not adhere to this concept.
With The Ashes slipping away from England in 1981, Ian Botham stepped down as captain, ‘moments before he was sacked’. On Thursday Wanindu Hasaranga did a Botham ending weeks of speculation about his future as Sri Lanka’s T-20 captain.
The World Cup was bad. Wanindu made some bad calls and Sri Lanka failed to make it to the second round. So did Pakistan and New Zealand. That’s part and parcel of the game. But what was more disturbing was Wanindu’s conduct during the Lanka Premier League.
One day Wanindu was aggressive towards a young player, the next day he copped a hefty fine for using incorrect equipment. These are things that could have been avoided. The Kandy team had been apparently given a prior warning about using the wrong helmet. Everyone else fell in line the next day but not Wanindu. He repeated the offence leaving officials with Hobson’s choice but to fine him. Nobody is bigger than the game. Everyone has to fall in line.
To his credit, Wanindu did win three bilateral series though. Some people brush aside these saying there’s no point in beating Bangladesh and Afghanistan. Well, Afghanistan did make the semi-finals of the World Cup and made the Aussies and the Kiwis eat humble pie.
Wanindu did bring a few good things into the side. He stressed on fielding brilliance and running well between the wickets. He backed certain players he had picked. But he did not treat everyone equally. In any dressing room there will be differences. It is said keep your friends close and your enemies closer. Wanindu kept his enemies at quite a distance. That did not help the team’s cause.
Then, there was an altercation with the umpires. That too in a dead rubber! That landed him in trouble earning a two-match suspension. It was ugly to watch. Wanindu is not the first Sri Lankan to take on an umpire. Others did it for bigger reasons to save people’s careers. Here the captain was trying to be childish protesting over a waist high no-ball. At school when you are starting your cricket you are taught that only two people are infallible: the Pope and the umpire.
Less than a month later he repeated the offence taking on anther umpire. He was facing a four-match ban and literally out of the World Cup. Sri Lanka retained him in the Test squad and let him serve the ban during the Test series.
A third suspension means Wanindu is set to miss eight games. That is too costly affair. Furthermore, with the T-20 World Cup two years away, it is sensible to hand over the captaincy to a new leader at the start of the cycle.
Wanindu is perhaps Sri Lanka’s biggest attraction in T-20 cricket at the moment, He was just misguided. It’s a pity that there was no one to give him sound advice on how to move about things. People keep a close eye on how you move about things. Everything is good when you are winning, but when you lose, it’s hell. As Abraham Lincoln said, ‘victory has a thousand fathers, defeat is an orphan.’
B Sai Sudarshan strengthened his case to retain the No.3 spot for the upcoming Test series in Sri Lanka, with his 168 for India A against Sri Lanka A in Galle. Sudharsan converted his overnight 104 not out into his career-best score for India A, helping his side stretch their lead to 175 by the end of the third day’s play. India A closed out the day on 541 for 8 in response to Sri Lanka A’s 366.
Devdutt Padikkal failed to add to his overnight 94 and Ruturaj Gaikwad retired hurt on 13, but India A zoomed ahead thanks to Sai Sudharsan, captain Dhruv Jurel (53), Shaik Rasheed (45) and Saransh Jain (68*).
Jurel’s innings was cut short when he was trapped lbw by left-arm spinner Dilum Sudeera, who also claimed the wicket of Sai Sudharsan. Allrounder Keshara Nuwantha, meanwhile, claimed the wickets of Padikkal and Shaik Rasheed, and Gurnoor Brar late in the day. Overall, he had figures of 4 for 158 in 50 overs.
Sri Lanka A toiled away, using as many as eight bowlers, but only Sudeera and Nuwantha were among the wickets until captain Sahan Arachchige struck late in the day.
India A’s bowling allrounders Saransh and Auqib Nabi (30) combined for an 81-run stand to take the visitors past 500.
Scores:
India A 541 for 8 in 142 overs (B Sai Sudharsan 168, Devdutt Padikkal 94, Druv Jurel 53, Saransh Jain 68*, Shaik Rasheed 45; Keshara Nuwantha 4-158, Dilum Sudeera 3-101) lead Sri Lanka A 366 in 110 overs (Sahan Arachchige 127; Gurnoor Brar 4-77, Saransh Jain 4-92) by 175 runs
(Cricinfo)
Vaobhav Sooriyavanshi at just 15 years and 99 days, has become the second youngest cricketer to play for a Full Member men’s team*, making his debut against England in Manchester. He enters a list of other precocious talents who had burst on to – and sometimes, gone away – from the international stage in their teenage years.
Hasan Raza (Pakistan), 14y 227d
Hasan Raza was a wonderful timer of the ball. He took the field against Zimbabwe before turning 15 in October 1996, and batted once, scoring 27 off 48 deliveries from No. 5.
Doubts, however, later emerged about his age, and the PCB withdrew the claim that Raza was the youngest men’s Test debutant in the history of the game.
Whether he was 14, or 15 as some claimed, he showed tenacity at the international stage but without the results. He played just one more Test before the turn of the century, and then was dropped from the side. A recall in 2002 resulted in his only two Test fifties, against Australia – slow knocks of 54* and 68. However, he never quite found the same success as he did in first-class cricket, where he scored 13,949 runs in a 20-year career.
Jhon Arias scored the only goal as Colombia beat Ghana 1-0 in sweltering conditions in Kansas City on Friday to reach the World Cup round of 16, continuing a quietly impressive campaign that has established them as dangerous outsiders.
Arias struck in the 14th minute, guiding home a cross from substitute Luis Suarez, and Colombia’s disciplined defence did the rest as Nestor Lorenzo’s side extended their unbeaten run and booked a meeting with Switzerland in the next round.
Colombia had largely flown under the radar at the tournament, despite going undefeated against Portugal, Uzbekistan and DR Congo to top Group K.
Their breakthrough on Friday came from two players who had not been expected to combine, as Suarez, thrust into action after Jhon Cordoba was forced off with an apparent groin injury in the eighth minute, delivered a pinpoint cross to the back post where Arias had somehow drifted unmarked.
With time and space to pick his spot, Arias calmly guided the ball into the bottom corner to hand his side a deserved lead.
The stadium felt more like Barranquilla than Kansas City as tens of thousands of Colombia supporters turned the clash with Ghana – a team ranked 60 places behind them – into a de facto home game, giving the South Americans a level of support rarely seen so far from home.
The stands were a writhing, dancing sea of yellow jerseys, twirling scarves and black-and-white sombrero vueltiao hats, that many used to fan their faces in the oppressive 30-degree Celsius (86-degree Fahrenheit) heat.
They bounced in unison, roared their team forward with every attack, and regularly broke into chants of “Vamos Colombia! Esta noche tenemos que ganar!” (Spanish for ‘Let’s go Colombia, tonight we have to win!’).
They need not have worried. Colombia were the better team by some distance.
Luis Diaz had numerous scoring chances. He fired into the side netting in the first half, then celebrated what he thought was the game’s second goal early in the second half when he slotted home Arias’s cross, but it was disallowed for offside.
Lorenzo’s men continued to push for a second goal, and Ghana goalkeeper Lawrence Ati-Zigi, who was excellent all night, made one terrific save after another in the dying minutes as Colombia’s fans cheered every one of their team’s touches of the ball.
Antoine Semenyo was Ghana’s biggest attacking threat, yet Colombia’s disciplined defence denied him a clear sight of goal.
Colombia became the fourth South American team to reach the last 16, joining surprise package Paraguay, who stunned Germany, along with Brazil and Argentina, both of whom survived scares of their own.
Colombia – whose best finish was reaching the quarterfinals in 2014 – play the Swiss on Tuesday in Vancouver.
[Aljazeera]
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