SRI LANKAN CRICKET... THE VICIOUS CYCLE....
Thought to discuss about the only holy subject for fellow Sri Lankans, "Cricket". Although different from rest of the region, we still do have a lot of passion about cricket and how our team do in the world arena. But so far, in the last decade, it has been nothing short of a vicious cycle. We have been consistently driven away from cricket and watching it throughout.. and just when we had enough and start to complain against wasting time watching it, the team starts to win inspiration-ally in a major tournament. So all those who opposed starts to post lion faces and posters on FB and look around for tickets in a hurry. The team builds up expectations, gathers us around....and when the judgement day comes, they fall short. Then the cycle continuous...
I believe its more important to analyze why this is becoming eye candy for statisticians in the field, that Sri Lanka is a team for the finals and finals only. What seems to be the reason for the lack of ability to go the last mile? Is it simply the lack of drive? Or last but not least, the presence of the president? I threw in the last one just for fun as we all had a good laugh out of it, and found the perfect scapegoat to point our fingers at. But later on, after the tournament, the cricket board has been hinting at some changes and also not surprisingly shifting the blame. It was implied by one press release that Sangakkara and Mahela are not suited for the format!!! This seems to imply that we lost the finals, because of a failure in the two most senior batsmen in the team... Yes, Sanga and Mahela might not be the best options for the hard hitting format, but they did carry us so far.. But they are not occupying those spots by denying the opportunity for hundreds of consistent hard hitting batsmen trying to get into the team. They are playing as we have no better! The board has not done its job of picking and selecting new talent!!!
Its true that Sanga and Mahela are not gonna be around, but its also true that they are really great players capable of adapting to any format. The matter of the fact is, Sri Lanka for the last decade have been TOP HEAVY in batting, Brilliant in bowling variety and Not the best fielders in a final under pressure. In other words, they have over achieved their potential by the time they get into the finals and the nerves in the crunch game can easily see through batting or fielding. The last final was a classic example of this. Fielding first of all was better overall, but still dropped the highest scorer in a hard chance. But given the hitters WI had, SL would have been glad to settle to chase anything under 200. But Dilshan's nervy dismissal rocked the boat for SL. Not sure about the sporadic middle order, the two seniors tried to be too watchful at the beginning and then gave their wickets away trying to beat the D/L method. So, if you look at it closely, its the lack of batting talent that has let us down. We don't posses a single batsman who can dismantle a bowling attack like Kalu and Jayasuriya could in 1996. What happened to the country who invented hitting out and over in the power play? Is it lack of talent or the lack of intellect in the selectors? What ever the reason is, this better be solved... the country can't bear a 5th consecutive runners up position!.
Akila.
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