Tennekoon to address SL's batting woes

Anura Tennekoon will assist the coaching staff in improving Sri Lanka's batting skills © Getty Images

Anura Tennekoon, the former Sri Lanka captain and prolific middle-order batsman, has been entrusted with the task of improving the batting skills of Sri Lanka's cricketers. Adel Hashim, Sri Lanka Cricket interim committee secretary, announced Tennekoon's appointment as an immediate measure to address batting worries.

"We all know the situation of our batsmen at the moment. We are in serious trouble both at national and `A' team level. The need to improve the batting skills of our batsmen has been identified. Tennekoon has been entrusted with that responsibility," said Hashim. "The replacement batsmen who are there are not putting enough pressure on the national players. The replacement should be able to match up to the person whom he is going to replace."

Tennekoon was a technically correct right-hand batsman of the pre-Test era and was a master accumulator of runs. He is at present managing the Sri Lanka `A' side. In addition to the batting, Hashim also stated that they were also on the look out for a specialist spin coach. "We have put in place a series of coaching structures from the head coach right down to grass root level. We have identified that provincial coaches is very important because cricketers who represent the country today come from all corners of the island, most of them from the outstations. If you don't nurture this area we probably are doing an injustice to our future generation."

"With the arrival of Tom Moody as national head coach we had a series of discussions of how we can help improve our support services for the players. It is a key area. We are looking to recruiting two additional physiotherapists so that the department is further strengthened to compete with the needs of today's demanding schedules."

Hashim also voiced the committees views on a variety of other topics:

The quality of pitches cannot be overhauled overnight. It's an enormous task. We looked at a model used in the English county circuit to improve the pitches and we are trying to expedite the process and see whether we can work within the model where the ECB has used to improve pitch conditions in UK. This will be implemented as early as possible with the support of the grounds and the clubs. We hope to improve the standard of batsmen and bowlers with better pitch conditions.

A brilliant umpire if he cannot communicate in English cannot go beyond the Premier tournament in this country. It is a crime that we have such talented umpires who cannot be pushed up the ladder.

Having assumed duties we saw that injustice had been done to four teams who were at the semi-final stage last year. For no apparent reason we were unable to give any explanation to the teams as to why the tournament was not completed in November. There was no tsunami in November; it took place on December 26. On a matter of principle we are trying to serve justice and agreed to allow the four teams play in the Premier tournament this year making it 20. The committee was also very firm on their original thinking that we will bring down the number of teams to 12 over a period of three years.

In this direction already decisions have been made to streamline the squads where the number of players who go through the academy is controlled. Players who had been in-house for six months are now subject to continue till one year by having day sessions. It will allow the coaching staff to continue to work with them in the long term rather than work with them for six months. The investment and time spent with the cricketers will be beneficial for both the cricketer and the management.

The whole purpose of inviting Arjuna to be chairman of the cricket committee was because we believed that he had much to give to the game. We know of his ability, talent and knowledge about the game. However some of the reasons he attributed for his resignation are not reasonable because Duleep Mendis (the present CEO) and me were also in the cricket committee. The interim committee accepted a good 90-95 percent of the recommendations made by the cricket committee. When sub committees make recommendations some will be accepted some will not be accepted. It was unfortunate that we had to come to this situation.

We tried hard but for reasons unexplainable in this forum we couldn't find a common ground. We know the capability of Sri Lankan coaches. Although cost was one of the factors there were other issues as well why we could not settle for a Sri Lankan coach. We wanted the best assistant coach.