Is Sri Lanka cricket doomed?
I am a proud citizen of Sri Lanka and love my country dearly. I am an avid fan of cricket having played the game at the highest level for school, Royal and at the Premier club level for SSC, in the company of yesteryear stalwarts, the Wettimuny brothers, Sidath and Sunil and Duleep Mendis to name a few.
I have been following the performance of our national team since the early ’70s, when I started playing cricket for Royal at Junior level, especially since the first World Cup in 1975.
My concern of a serious situation, which is brewing for our cricket and unless cohesive remedial action is not taken, could lead to a tragic debacle engulfing our cricket, and it would not be possible to positively reverse the situation, at any cost later on.
The rapid decline of our cricket is somewhat difficult to comprehend.
What is this grave crisis facing our cricket and why is it so relevant during this period of time?
The cracks started to appear, during our tour of South Africa, where we had a severe thrashing. We returned home and were convincingly beaten by lowly placed Zimbabwe 3-2 and that too in a home ODI series. We must not forget the fact that, we had earlier series wins against Zimbabwe, as an away series.
Not so long ago, in a home series of three Test matches, we beat the mighty Aussies with a resounding series win of 3-0. We achieved this feat with more or less the same team, which is now facing an uphill task of re-grouping themselves, to be on the path of success.
What needs to be done now? In my opinion, appoint an experienced person to steer our ship with well acknowledged credentials.
As a concerned person, I would like to humbly urge the authorities to take remedial action immediately.
Pradeep Kariyawasam