Sri Lanka cricketers must learn by their mistakes (12 November 1998)

12 November 1998

Sri Lanka cricketers must learn by their mistakes

by P Epasinghe

Sri Lanka sinks like the Titanic - This was one of the interesting banners displayed at the Sri Lanka - Zimbabwe ODI cricket encounter played at the Sharjah Stadium.

The Titanic the "unsinkable" ocean-liner, 46,329 ton monster that rammed an iceberg on its first voyage, has become a symbol of human vanity.

When Sri Lanka played Zimbabwe, most of the cricket fans in the world thought, that Sri Lanka - world champions, are "undefeatable". After the defeat at the hands of India, the world champs Sri Lankans went down tamely to the minnows of Cricket - Zimbabwians.

Post-mortems never revive the dead they say. However, the fact remains that it could throw some light on how the patient succumbed to its injuries. Therefore, lets constructively analyze what went wrong for the Sri Lankans.

To begin with, Sri Lanka failed in batting, bowling and fielding. The fighting spirit and guts of the Sri Lankan outfit slowly faded away from them. The runs that flowed off their bats, have dried up. The bowling and fielding were also not up to the mark. Adding to its woes, Sri Lanka's best bowler, off-spinner Muttiah Muralitharan is on the injured list and in the pavilion. Even "Captain Cool" lost his fighting qualities to a certain extent in the two encounters and I think he made some mistakes. I presume, his not bowling Chaminda Vaas (8-0-19-2) his full quota of overs, and not changing Kumar Dharmasena, (10-0-69-0) when he was blasted by Indian skipper Mohammed Azharuddin on his way to his erasing Haynes (8,648) record in ODI's, showed, that he made a tactical blunder of course, Arjuna Ranatunga, the most experienced captain is not infallible, and I am sure, as all of us do, we will learn by our mistakes. :Wides and no-balls

Apart from the Sri Lankan batting, their bowling is much to be desired. In the games against India and Zimbabwe, they conceded 26 and 17 extras respectively which included 11 wides, 06 no-balls, 7 wides and 7 no-balls. In both games, the tally of wides and no-balls amounts to 31 extra balls and extra runs. With this type of bowling, Sri Lanka does not deserve to win. I presume that bowlers, bowl wides and no-balls, when they have lost confidence in bowling. This is the first priority that the Sri Lankan cricket authorities, should take note of and their remedy this flaw.

You must always remember that a batsman has just one chance. There are eleven, all conspiring to bring about his downfall. Therefore, you must not make any mistakes. By watching the Sri Lankans bat, I noticed that most of our experienced batsmen had a tendency to play across the line of the ball, without playing a straight bat, against Zimbabwe. Five Sri Lankan batsmen - Jayasuriya, Gunawardane, Atapattu, De Silva and Samaraweera, were ruled out leg before-wicket.

Our success rate was very high, when our frontline batsmen bloomed and when our fielding was world standard.

With my personal experience as an opener, I know that of all positions in the batting line up, the opening berth requires the batsman to know his strengths and limitations and play accordingly. Further, you must have the right temperament, a sense of responsibility, patience, determination and ability to concentrate. Your first basic priority is to avoid the fielders and find the gaps in building up the team total. Consistency of our batsmen was something that lacked in these two matches at Sharjah.

It is true that the Sri Lanka cricketers before embarking on these two tours - Bangladesh and Sharjah did not have much out door and match practice due to the inclement weather that prevailed during October and early November. This also may be a contributory factor for their poor performance in Bangladesh and Sharjah.

Whatever it is, before leaving to Australia for the world series (England, Australia and Sri Lanka) triangular in Australia in late December the team have to do lot of home work under the highly respected coach Roy Dias and Manager Ranjith Fernando. They are quite capable of putting them right.

The Faculty of Medical Sciences of the University of Sri Jayewardenepura, should be highly commended for organising the first ever limited-over cricket tournament among all the local Medical Faculties including Jaffna. This tournament will commence on Saturday November 14 and the finals will be played on Sunday, November 22.

Upul Gunasekera, an old Mahindian, fourth year medical student, of the University of Sri Jayewardenepura, the President of the Medical Faculty Sports Club is delighted with the fine response of the Jaffna medicos. They eagerly await their arrival to Colombo to participate in this tournament. Jaffna Medical Faculty cricket team is led by S. Varthan and the Faculty of Medical Sciences of the University of Jayewardenepura, will be captained by Peterite, final year medical student Dilshard Soodin. Dinesh Karunaratne, an old boy of D.S. Senanayake M.V., Colombo, fourth year medical student is the treasurer of the organising committee with Sumangalian Kosala Perera as tournament secretary and, Isipatanian Nepul Dharmatilake as the cricket co-ordinator of the faculty of medical sciences of the University of Sri Jayewardenepura. The entire committee has done a marvellous job in organising a tournament of this nature among all medical faculties, in the island.

This tournament, is the brain-child of former Nalanda leg-spinner cum all-rounder and former University of Ceylon Colombo cricket captain (1977) Dr. Mohan de Silva, presently, the Head of the Department of Surgery, Faculty of Medical Sciences, University of Sri Jayewardenepura and consultant surgeon Colombo South Teaching Hospital (CSTH) and the Dean of the Faculty of Medical Science, Professor M.T.M. Jiffery. Vice-chancellor Professor P.W. Wilson is delighted in organising this tournament and is making all arrangements to make this event a grand success.

These medical faculty matches will be played at the Sri Jayewardenepura University grounds, Gangodawila, Nugegoda, and at the University of Moratuwa grounds on November 14 and 15 and the finals will be played on the 22nd at the University of Sri Jayewardenepura grounds.

The Medical faculties of Colombo, Jaffna, Peradeniya, Ruhuna, Kelaniya and Jayewardenepura will take part in the tournament.

Source :: Daily News (https://www.lanka.net)