By Sa’adi Thawfeeq- The Nation reports
Sri Lanka has in its midst after quite a long time a captain who can think straight and is not afraid to put across his opinion about any subject.
One of the nominees for the ICC’s Best Captain of the Year award for the second consecutive year Mahela Jayawardene aired his views to The Nation on the inaugural Twenty20 World Cricket Championships to be held in South Africa from September 13-25 and he made no bones about what he thought of the tournament.
For Jayawardene nothing comes better than Test Cricket. His personal opinion: “As an individual person I feel that Test Cricket is the challenge for any cricketer. One-day cricket is excellent. It develops skill that needs a different challenge. For every player who wants to play cricket and for his country the ultimate goal is to play Test Cricket and challenge themselves to be better cricketers.”
Jayawardene’s views on the new format that has been introduced to international cricket: “Twenty20 is another different format. It will definitely help different skills of individual players. It will be a definite revolution in world cricket. To have a World Cup, I don’t know whether it is the right time, whether it is too soon. It is the first time it’s happening and everyone is looking forward to it to see how they can handle the situation, how big is the occasion. There will be a big role for the players to play in this format.”
Sri Lanka can consider themselves to be novices when it comes to this form of cricket at international level. Their track record is just three Twenty20 internationals of which they have won ----. It is not that other countries have played more international Twenty20 matches than Sri Lanka, but the fact remains that they have been playing it at domestic level for a longer period than us. Twenty20 cricket was introduced in tournament form amongst clubs in this country in 2005 and it has not really caught up as it has in most other countries.
But Jayawardene does not think the lack of experience would be a setback to his team.
“The shorter the game, it becomes more open. There are no clear favourites. A lot of sides have a lot of all-rounders trying to play a different brand of cricket. Everyone has a very good opportunity to do well.”
“We haven’t played that much but we have an understanding of what is required basically. We need to make slight adjustments with a few individuals and how we’ve got to approach it. At the end of the day it has to be basic cricket and play proper cricket. I think we have a very good chance,” Jayawardene said.
Speaking further he said: “It’s important to think that every match we play in the tournament is vital for us. That’s the attitude we have. We are going to make sure that all the challenges that are in front of us, we are going to take it with a smile and see what we can come up with. We’ve got the people to do that in the team.”
“It is very important for us to compete very well in this tournament and try and win it. It’s a World Cup and the first of its kind. We haven’t gone into the finer details of the tournament and how important it is to win it. Once we get there we will motivate the guys to realize how very important this tournament is. It is a tournament we could easily do well. It is definitely going to be another feather in our cap if we can do something special,” Jayawardene stated.
Jayawardene said the emphasis would be on batting. “For twenty overs you’ve got ten wickets in hand. Basically you give a licence to the batsmen to go after the bowling. If the bowlers can keep a cool head and try and take wickets upfront and be more aggressive with the ball, you will definitely create more opportunities.”
“Whoever we put out on the park has to know what role he has to play. We’ve got some experienced players who can adjust to different situations. There are key players like Sanath (Jayasuriya), Sanga (Kumar Sangakkara) and myself plus the bowlers. They have a very good opportunity to be an attacking unit. If we can pick up wickets it is always going to be good because we can slow things down. We’ll definitely be looking forward to attacking a lot,” said Jayawardene.
Preparation wise Sri Lanka has not done anything different considering the intensity the much shorter version of the game is going to bring.
“We are gradually getting into the one-day mood of the game and making slight adjustments regarding different situations that we have to face in Twenty20 cricket. We first need to see the wickets, how it is going to be in South Africa. Once we see know that we can have a plan how we’ll go about it and see what our options are. We’ve got a balanced squad with a few all rounders in it,” said Jayawardene.
Sri Lanka has two practice matches against Pakistan and New Zealand on September 8 and 9 before they go into the tournament proper. Sri Lanka’s opening match of their group (Group C) is against Kenya on September 14 followed by the one against New Zealand on September 15. The first two teams in each of the four groups will proceed to the SuperEight stages.
SRI LANKA SQUAD: Mahela Jayawardene (captain), Kumar Sangakkara (vice-captain), Sanath Jayasuriya, Upul Tharanga, Jehan Mubarak, Tillakaratne Dilshan, Chamara Silva, Chaminda Vaas, Farveez Maharoof, Hasantha Fernando, Kaushal Lokuarachchi, Gayan Wijekoon, Dilhara Fernando, Lasith Malinga, Muttiah Muralitharan.
Officials: Sriyan Samararatne (manager), Trevor Bayliss (coach), Paul Farbrace (assistant coach), Tommy Simsek (physio), Jade Roberts (trainer), Lal Thamal (masseur), Nalin de Alwis (computer analyst).
TeamSpan Mat Won Lost Tied NR %
Australia
2005-2007 5 3 2 0 0 60.00
Bangladesh
2006-2006 1 1 0 0 0 100.00
England
2005-2007 6 2 4 0 0 33.33
India
2006-2006 1 1 0 0 0 100.00
New Zealand
2005-2006 5 2 2 1 0 50.00
Pakistan
2006-2007 2 1 1 0 0 50.00
South Africa
2005-2007 5 2 3 0 0 40.00
Sri Lanka
2006-2006 3 2 1 0 0 66.66
West Indies
2006-2007 3 1 1 1 0 50.00
Zimbabwe
2006-2006 1 0 1 0 0 0.0
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