PART ONE
At any one moment and in the immediate future a country’s cricketing capacities depend in part on its bench strength, the reserves in the wings so to speak and thus on it’s B Team, or rather, the A Squad as it is called. Injuries occur among the top fifteen players. Pacemen are especially liable to breakdown. Indeed, during the past year Maharoof, Malinga, Welagedera, Dilhara Fernando and, now, Dhammika Prasad have been sidelined at some point or other by injury or strain. Only idiots – and there have been one or two such voices on display – would blame Sri Lanka Cricket and/or the medical staff for such happenings. One has only to look over the record of English South African and Australian fast bowlers in recent years to accept that this is a perennial issue.
(File Photo) Sri Lanka outplayed the Indians at the National Stadium, Karachi, winning by 100 runs to lift the Asia Cup for a fourth time
It is to the credit of SLC, from Sumathipala’s time to Jayantha Dharmadasa’s recent spell, that they organised many A Squad tours and/or home series over the last 4 or 5 years. Contradicting Marvan Atapattu’s absurd "muppett" outburst, one can say that such building work has generated fresh talent and sustained Sri Lanka’s bench strength. The Duleep Trophy series in India revealed the abilities of Chamara Silva and Malinda Warnapura as well as the potential of Kaushal Silva as wicket-keeper batsman. Warnapura (and captain Dilshan) scored heavily in Zimbabwe in late 2007, while Dilruwan Perera revealed his allrounder capacities. Dhammika Prasad was part of the A Squad touring England in late-summer 2007. Instances could be multiplied ….
Hathurasingha
I had the good fortune to chat with Chandika Hathurasingha on a few occasions in the course of the Indian series during my visit to Sri Lanka in July-August. He was adamant that the impending A Tour of South Africa should be one that was development-oriented with a longer term perspective. He agreed that for the Duleep Trophy series in India Sri Lanka needed the best reserve squad on hand since the objective was to win the trophy (they came runners-up I believe) in competition with the best provincial sides. But for A Series of the South African type he wished the Board to be more future-oriented. For this reason he was opposed to the selection of older players who had been performing well in the domestic circuit — for instance, Lanka de Silva, Gayan Wijekoon and Hasantha Fernando whose names I brought up. Indeed, the radio commentator, Haritha Perera, was even more adamant on this point when I raised the topic with him at Dambulla. So Hathuru had other voices in line with him on this issue. The case is not cut and dried however: I will return to it at the end. The Saf tour by the A Squad demands our attention first.
My conversations with Hathuru were before the squad was named. He indicated that he had told the selectors what his wishes were with reference to the "composition" of the squad of XV, that is, how many batsmen, bowlers, allrounders et cetera. Clearly, he would have had more specific inputs, but was not in a position to divulge details to me. Once the squad was announced, a few days after our talk, he was clearly unhappy, but, understandably, could not say more. Reading Sa’adi Thawfeeq’s news report on the subject, however, one may suspect that the decision not to include the off-spinner Sachitra Senanayake (who had an outstanding domestic season in the A tier) and the (left-arm?) mystery leg spinner, Seekkug? Prasanna, left him fuming. Instead the older hands Rangana Herath and Malinga Bandara had been selected.
Spin bowlers
Since Ajantha Mendis burst into the front ranks in lethal fashion a few months back, we are now considering the issue of back-up strength whenever Murali needs a rest or should some untoward injury occur. Even before Mendis’s capacities were revealed, Herath (aged 30) has been the subject of extreme prejudice in cyber-circles in contrast to the favoured son, Malinga Bandara (aged 29). Herath is underestimated as a spinner and his usefulness with the bat is not considered. Playing for the A team in the foreign conditions of Zimbabwe in October-November 2007 against what was virtually their First Eleven, he had the following figures:
ONE: 16-4-39-2 (in a drawn game)
TWO: 11.4-3-25-4 and 14-2-45-3 (match won)
ODI ONE: 8-0-35-1
ODI TWO: 10-0-19-4
ODI THREE:10-0-24-3
— all matches won.
A little earlier, playing against the full Indian XI in a three-day game at Grace Road, Leicester, he had figures of 18-1-62-2 (out of five wkts to fall) when India declared in the first innings and then had 13-4-66-2 (out of six wkts) when the match was drawn. In fact, he reached the figure of 500 first-class wickets during this match, no mean feat.
That said, I would certainly have omitted Herath from the Saf tour and chosen one of the new spinners in tandem with Bandara, with the latter being rewarded for his patience and kept in good trim, so to speak, by this exercise. My argument here is that one needs to combine experience (Bandara) with potential good recruit (whether Senanayake or Prasanna). Sending two raw spinners was/is a risk. It would not help Sri Lanka’s reserve forces if one sent 15 raw recruits on an A tour and they were massacred on the field because of their lack of experience and/or steel.
Here, it is important to note that the A squad also includes two spinning allrounders, Dilruwan Perera (off spin and Gihan Rupesinghe (left arm leg spin). Perera is a genuine all rounder, where Rupesinghe is more of a batsman. When one considers the fact that one has two other young allrounders in the background, namely, Milinda Siriwardene and Sachith Pathirana, then, SL’s future is good.
Siriwardene (aged 23 and with the Chilaw Marians now) was touted as a prospective left-arm spinner by Jerome Jayaratne some years back, but has recently making waves as a batsmen in the U23 Tournament after missing most of the main domestic season. Pathirana, the 19-year old Trinitian who skippered the U 19 Team recently, has a good record at the tenn level and long experience in captaincy (important that).— so good that
There were some avid cyber-net fans who were even selecting Pathirana for the first XV in what must be treated as fits of absurd, utopian expectation. We have had occasional successes in bumping individuals up from teenage cricket to the highest level: Arjuna Ranatunga and Aravinda de Silva are the prime examples, while Farveez Maaharoof and Chamara Kapugedera are more recent ones. But such decisions effecting radical double promotions up the ladder must be taken by accredited individuals who have observed the players closely over a series of matches. For any armchair observers, such as this author, to impose such choices confidently on the basis of U 19 statistics is quite horrendous.
So, in sum, we have Muralitharan, Mendis, Bandara, Herath, Senanayake, Prasanna, Perera, Siriwardene and Pathirana as our spinning stock at present (besides a host of other lefties). Given such a list, Kaushal Lokuarachchi (aged 26; who toured England with the A Squad in July-August 2007) and Sajeewa Weerakoon (who played for the A Team on several occasions a few years back) must be aware that their prospects are bleak unless they produce some miracle.
The lengthy list also underlines the difficulties faced by the Selectors. How are they to provide the last four named with decent opportunities at A level? Invariably, one or two players are going to miss out. This is why selections at the A team level can be of such momentous significance for individual players and why we outsiders have to police issues of favouritism carefully and fairly.
Pacemen
The most enlightening instance of Hathuru’s long-term strategy was revealed during his remarks on the fast bowling complement. He emphasised the fact that our leading body of pacemen, inclusive of the promising new find, Dhammika Prasad, are aged 26 or over. So, Sri Lanka Cricket – and here Anushya Samaranayake and Jerome Jayaratne would surely have been involved – have identified some young bowlers in the age range 18-to-20 who possess genuine pace a s well as general potential. "Isuru Udana, Suranga Lakmal and Pradeep" are the names that have been entered in my notebook. The selectors responded to this call for long-term nourishment. Lakmal was inserted into the A Team Squad and, then, when Prasad suffered an injury, Udana replaced Prasad. Thus, two rookies joined the experienced hands, Sujeeva de Silva Welagedera (recovered from injury) and Ishara Amerasinghe, for the A Team’s tour of South Africa. Plaudits are due here for the SLC Selection Committtee.
Captaincy
Thilina Kandambi (aged 26) was appointed skipper for this tour. Kandambi captained the U19 squad during their tour of Australia in 1999 and I was impressed by his on-field and off-field demeanour in Adelaide during the course of a Test Match marked by blatantly prejudiced umpiring. Since then his batting performances for Bloomfield were quite ordinary till 2007 and, during the limited opportunities available to him as a "fringe squad member" on the occasional tour, his achievements were patchy. By moving to the SSC and responding to Naweed Nawaz’s guidance, he resurrected his career: in the 2007-08 season his Premier League statistics read as 822 runs in 12 innings for an average of 68.50 – third in line behind Thilan Samaraweera (aged 32, av. = 86.14) and Tharanga Paranavitana (aged 26; av. = 74.41).
Kandambi is a left-handed batsman in the same mould as Arjuna Ranatunga both in anatomical form and in style of batting — with improvisations galore. He has also revealed an ability to hit sixes so he is definitely a prospect as a middle and/or top order batsman in both forms of the game. The only reservation I have is about his degree of cricket-quickness in the field within the middle ring, an issue about which I cannot comment without observation of his movements at the present moment.
Part II tomorrow *******************
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