Savio, Yasith guide St. Joseph Vaz to semis
Phillips’ century, Duffy’s four-for topple India
Pakistan vs Sri Lanka in the perfect finale to entertaining tri-series
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The national cricket team is bracing for a major shake up, with several new faces set to be drafted into the national set up as officials begin plotting a course towards next year’s World Cup.
The national team has endured a wretched two months across all three formats and several prominent players are now in the firing line ahead of the tour of Pakistan, one of the longest assignments undertaken by a Sri Lankan side in recent memory.
The Pakistan tour will stretch across 46 days, with Sri Lanka playing three T20Is, a tri-nation ODI series involving England, followed by two Test matches.
Two former captains, in particular, are under the pump.
Former white ball skipper Wanindu Hasaranga has been left out of the T20I squad and is unlikely to be considered for the ODIs either, with concerns over his attitude understood to have ruffled feathers within the hierarchy.
Hasaranga was sent home midway through the recent tour of England after an unusual sequence of events. It is understood that the leg-spinner had gone to watch a football match and on his return, complained of back pain that ruled him out of the opening ODI. SLC subsequently decided to send him home. Although the injury was considered only a minor niggle, the selectors now appear ready to draw a line in the sand by overlooking him for the Pakistan games.
Test captain Dhananjaya de Silva is also on shaky ground. He is expected to lose the captaincy and could even struggle to retain his place in the playing XI. Kusal Mendis, who leads Sri Lanka in limited-overs cricket, is expected to take over the Test reins on an interim basis.
The Cricket Transformation Committee is also looking at clipping the wings of players who spend considerable time on the franchise circuit. One proposal would restrict a player to two overseas franchise tournaments, while players could also be required to leave their franchise commitments and report to Colombo at least a week before Sri Lanka embark on an international assignment.
The arrival of several players in England directly from franchise commitments in the Caribbean is understood to have gone down badly in some quarters.
With the old guard under scrutiny, opportunity is knocking for several youngsters who have put their hands up in domestic cricket. A number of them are expected to be blooded during the Pakistan tour as Sri Lanka begin building towards next year’s World Cup.
The winds of change are not confined to the dressing room either.
Moves are also under way to overhaul the administration of Sri Lanka Cricket. The Cricket Transformation Committee is understood to be unimpressed with the returns delivered by some of the board’s highest paid executives but has little room to manoeuvre until their contracts expire. The absence of exit clauses in some of those agreements has proved a costly administrative blunder.
Meanwhile, the proposed new constitution for SLC is gathering momentum, with its architects hoping to transform the governing body into a more professional organisation in keeping with some of the leading cricket boards around the world.
Similar reforms were proposed in 2015 when Sidath Wettimuny headed an interim administration with the backing of then Sports Minister Navin Dissanayake. A new constitution was drafted by respected legal scholar Prasanna Jayawardena, but the government of the day showed little appetite to push the reforms through and eventually handed the reins back to elected officials.
Had those reforms been implemented in 2015, SLC might have emerged as a far more robust institution. Instead, elected administrations continued to call the shots, too often with little long term vision or pragmatism.
Public criticism over the manner in which SLC has been administered has mounted over the years, leaving the government with something approaching Hobson’s choice. It eventually decided to take the bull by the horns despite the risk of suspension by the global governing body in Dubai.
In a shrewd move, the government brought respected former players Sidath Wettimuny, Roshan Mahanama and Kumar Sangakkara into the committee overseeing cricket affairs during the transition, lending considerable credibility to the reform process.
The new constitution is expected to be in place by the end of the year, although legal challenges appear inevitable.
As The Sunday Island has previously reported, several leading lawyers were beneficiaries of the previous SLC administration’s willingness to spend record sums on legal fees. With another battle looming, it would hardly raise eyebrows if some of the same legal eagles were soon singing for their supper again.
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The sixth wicket pair of Savio Fernando and Yasith Gimsara put on an unbroken partnership of 72 runs to guide St. Joseph Vaz College Wennappuwa to a four wickets win over Dharmaraja College in the Under 19 Division I Tier B quarter final played in Kandy on Friday.
Chasing 139 runs to win the boys from Wennappuwa were struggling at 67 for six wickets at one stage before Savio and Gimsara joined to turn the tide.
Savio Fernando anchored the chase with an unbeaten 51 off 84 balls, while Yasith Gimsara provided valuable support with an unbeaten 41 off 73 deliveries. Muthuranga De Silva chipped in with 21.
Batting first, Dharmaraja were dismissed for 138 in 40.1 overs as Amal Denuwan led the way with a four wicket haul.
Tharindu Warnakulage top-scoring with 59 off 72 balls, including eight boundaries. Gaveesh Poorna contributed 34 runs.
Denuwan was the pick of the bowlers, claiming four wickets for 18 runs in 7.1 overs. Lowthuru Dilpahan took two wickets for 32 runs.
In reply, St. Joseph Vaz reached 139 for five in 39 overs to secure victory.
Malisha Gunasekara took two wickets for 19 runs for Dharmaraja, but his efforts were not enough to prevent the visitors from claiming victory.
New Zealand had to break all-time records to be a challenge for, India. Glenn Philips’ century and Michael Bracewell with a balls-per-boundary ratio of just over two carried the team to the highest T20 score on these shores, including domestic matches. Faced with a target of 260, India felt scoreboard pressure for the first time and the options they took to dispel it didn’t work.
For all the highlight reels he produces, Phillips uses orthodox methods to start his innings. He takes it slow, sets himself up and once he’s around 30 or so, he explodes. But as a response to batting first at Eden Park, a ground famously chase-friendly, he changed his game.
The second ball he faced was top of off stump but he short-arm pulled it in the air over midwicket. With the powerplay about to end, he moved across his crease to drag a length ball from Prince Yadav into the leg side for four. By that time he was already 26 off 14. He took a while to get to fifty – 31 balls – but his next 10 produced 40 runs.
If there is something slightly disconcerting about this tri series, which concludes when Sri Lanka play hosts Pakistan in the final on Saturday, it’s that everything seems to have gone as it should. The pitches, across Rawalpindi and Lahore, have varied enough to offer contests of more than just one flavour. The sides have been relatively well-balanced, and relatively full-strength. The weather has played ball. The crowds built up most games, and packed the stadium out by the evenings.
For once, there was little by way of off-field drama to talk about, which is always a win for Pakistan. And it all culminates with quite a juicy-looking contest between two sides whose strengths are different enough to offer real tactical intrigue, but strength they both unmistakably have.
Pakistan will view the final as a tabula rasa , putting Tuesday’s crushing defeat in the league game against Sri Lanka firmly behind them. They can afford to do so because by winning the first three games of the tri-series, they had already secured safe passage to the final. Those wins came in different forms, from the clinical to the utterly dramatic. But there was enough to demonstrate it was those three victories rather than the disappointment of the last game that served up the more faithful reflection of their true abilities.
They have one very clear strength, and one obvious weakness. Their bowling attack has been comfortably the best of the teams over the past two weeks, with plenty of variety in the pace trio of Shaheen Shah Afridi, Naseem Shah and Haris Rauf. Complemented by Arafat Minhas and Shadab Khan’s spin bowling, it saw them defend two arguably below-par scores in their first two matches, and keep England to a modest 241 in their third.
But the strength in bowling is offset by a glaring vulnerability in the top order of their batting, with each of the top three out of form, and the lower-middle order tasked with making up the difference. When that doesn’t happen, as was the case earlier against England last week and against Sri Lanka three days back, the wheels can fall off alarmingly quickly.
Pavan Rathnayake has hit two centuries in the tri-series so far (Cricinfo)
That win was dominant enough for Sri Lanka to go into the final with a slight psychological edge. That game aside, Sri Lanka’s dynamic big-hitting with the bat has lit the tournament up for them, and memorialised immortally with that monstrous run chase of 430 against England. They have breached 330 twice this tournament, and boast the top-scorer in Pavan Rathnayake. The bowling might not have had quite the same impact, but as Dilshan Madushanka showed against Pakistan, it is capable of landing some devastating blows on its day.
Sri Lanka are aware no one fancies defending a total against them at the moment, and even if England managed it on Thursday, Sri Lanka scored 331, higher than any Pakistan total this series. Pakistan’s bowlers, however, did keep them out in the tournament opener, quickly neutering the top order before shooting out the last five batters at the death. It is that match-up, of Pakistan’s bowling against Sri Lanka’s batting, which looks set to determine the destination of the tri-series trophy. Handling the pressure of a final will just be part of the allure.
And as far as handling the pressure of a final at the Gaddafi Stadium goes, Sri Lanka will be fairly confident they are up to the challenge.
Babar Azam has been one of the weak links in the Pakistan batting (Cricinfo)
It is, perhaps, the obvious call, but there’s little point pretending the focus won’t be on Babar Azam ahead of another big final. For the profile he enjoys in Pakistan and the talent he possesses, the most damning charge levelled at Babar is his perceived inability to rise to the challenge of a big occasion. Babar’s oeuvre of odds-defying knocks under pressure is conspicuously barren compared to his talent.
Even in his current, reduced state of effectiveness, Babar managed good starts in three of his four innings in this tri-series, breaching double-figures but getting out before making a contribution of substance. Saturday represents one more chance to change all that with another World Cup looming.
This series has been the making of a new Sri Lanka star. A fortnight ago, Pavan Rathnayake was a young, wet-behind-the-ears prospect for his side, boasting a handful of internationals and a heap of potential as yet unrealised. For the final, he is Sri Lanka’s talisman after lighting up the tournament. Rathnayake scored two big hundreds against England, demonstrating his dazzling ability as well as the nerve to hold his own under pressure.
It all began with 79 against Pakistan in the opening game that turned the middle overs around for Sri Lanka, and with better support, should have seen them through to victory. He has scored 350 runs, averaged 116.67, and struck at 123.67. It has been a perfect tri-series for the 24-year old, and on Saturday, it could get the perfect finish.
Pakistan will have to choose between Sahibzada Farhan and Fakhar Zaman for the final (Cricinfo)
Pakistan will have to take a call on Fakhar Zaman, balancing his reputation for big-match performances with his current dismal form. Sahibzada Farhan joined the Pakistan squad, arriving from Nepal on the morning of the game against Sri Lanka on Tuesday, but was not deemed ready enough to start. That is the most consequential decision the hosts are likely to have to make as they look to primarily stick with the formula that won them the first three matches.
Pakistan : Maaz Sadaqat, Fakhar Zaman/Sahibzada Farhan, Babar Azam, Saad Baig (wk), Salman Agha, Hasan Nawaz, Arafat Minhas, Shadab Khan, Shaheen Shah Afridi (capt), Naseem Shah, Haris Rauf
Sri Lanka have fielded the same side for the last two games. Despite defeat in a dead rubber, there should be little incentive to change the side that dismantled Pakistan at the same venue on Tuesday.
Sri Lanka : Kamindu Mendis, Avishka Fernando, Kusal Mendis (capt, wk), Pavan Rathnayake, Sahan Arachchige, Janith Liyanage, Dasun Shanaka, Dunith Wellalage, Eshan Malinga, Asitha Fernando, Dilshan Madushanka
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