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| Sunday, 8 June 2003 |
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Arjuna has role to play ... : Thilanga Sumathipala vows to clean up cricket mess by SRIAN OBEYESEKERE and RANJAN ANANDAPPA
If it was an `agony to ecstasy' forceful comeback to the Cricket Board for Thilanga Sumathipala whose bag immediately delivered a foreign coach in Australian born John Dyson, in the euphoria of the 121 votes to 7 triumph over former Sri Lankan cricket captain, Arjuna Ranatunga which would more aptly read as an innings win, the illustrative picture as one entered the game's headquarters of Ranatunga and Aravinda de Silva embracing the world cup they brought home in 1996 was indeed moving. For even as the morning took on a festive air of celebrations in Sumathipala mounting the head chair of the Board of Control for Cricket in Sri Lanka (BCCSL), that Ranatunga and de Silva, the former captain and vice captain of that triumphant world cup team, went their separate ways must leave cricket the loser. A fact perhaps best typified by Sumathipala's own words soon after ascending the chair for the third time as president of the BCCSL in saying, "we feel that where Sri Lankan cricket is concerned he'll (Ranatunga) will have a role to play. My invitation to Arjuna remains to join my team". But since, the old firm of Ranatunga and de Silva, who took Sri Lanka together to new heights that memorable day in Lahore as the vice captain, an epic century under his belt, watched from the other end his captain fittingly belt Shane Warne for a six to seal the match against bitter rivals Australia in that final, many summers have gone by. Seven years hence, while Ranatunga, immaculately clad in a white national dress, cut a sad day for Lankan cricket as he strode off in the face of a huge defeat at Friday mornings hustings of the BCCSL held for the first time away at the Sports Science Institute at Torrington Square under tight Police security, vowing not to take his rival's olive branch, the evening at the BCCSL conference hall saw de Silva, arguably the country's champion of batsmen for his yeoman service on the world stage, hold the floor with Sumathipala as he outlined the finer details of the coming of John Dyson to fill the void left behind by Dav Whatmore. As the cameras kept clicking on Sumathipala, clad in a black suit and white shirt, and his team which included Mohan de Silva as secretary, a former Ananda College cricketer, who polled 10 votes as a third contestant for the presidency, whom he said had negotiated with Dyson with effect from August 1, the president-elect gestured to Aravinda de Silva who is one of the two vice presidents along with M. J. M. Muzamil, to brief the media on the credentials of the new coach. Aravinda, who soon after the hustings signalled his arrival when he told the 'Sunday Observer' that `its a challenge to raise the standard of the game', said, "We've spoken to John Dyson, the former Australian cricketer whom we feel is in touch with modern techniques of coaching methods and he's got his Masters Degree in fitness and sports psychology. He has much experience having worked with such coaches like former Australian captain, Bob Simpson and Peter Philpot having distinguished himself with New South Wales." But the day belonged to the controversial Sumathipala, who was the cynosure of all eyes. If Ranatunga held in defeat that he had contested merely to expose what he called was a system which had to be changed, Sumathipala, who headed the BCCSL on two previous occasions, had as he told the `Sunday Observer' no sooner the results were announced returned to `where I deserve to be.' He centred around a 3-year legal wrangle which strifed the BCCSL. The last time he contested the presidency and won in 1999, Sumathipala was unseated by a courts ruling after rival candidate, Clifford Ratwatte sought legal redress on the grounds that the elections were rigged. But Sumathipala claimed that he had been denied his rightful place when he was the popular choice of the clubs. Ranatunga's parting words were, "The whole world should realise what sort of system we have in this country. And that is the main reason that I wanted to contest and show the country. Not only the country, even the whole world. The whole world should realise what sort of system we have in this country. I think that the top people in this country should open their eyes and see. Otherwise cricket will go down. It is already down." He said that the 7 votes was `more than what I expected'. "I am glad that `atleast 7 people in this country love the game." He said that he would have to reconsider whether he would contest future BCCSL elections. "If the system is like this I don't think any of the past players will get involved if they are not in their camp. I'm not a guy who will go behind anyone. I wanted to prove a point and I have achieved that. I'm very glad about it. For Sumathipala, Friday the 6 saw the cup overflow in raptures of joy soon after the results were announced by the election authority, Milton Amarasinghe, the Director of Sports. The verdict of which Sumathipala hailed as a `certificate given by the cricketing family' whose aspirations as representatives of the country's cricket clubs in electing members of their choice had been realised. "I would like to see that Maitland Crescent will continue to hold elections to elect members to the BCCSL", beamed Sumathipala who thanked the Prime Minister and Sports Minister on behalf of all the clubs for enabling the long overdue hustings. He said that he expected to put the house in order in a month's time at a time the BCCSL was staring at a critical turn of events, the worst of which was the 93 million (US $ 740,000) financial crisis aggravated by the 1.11 billion loss by terminating the WSG Nimbus t.v. deal. "There is no excuse for terminating this deal with WSG Nimbus which is a subsidiary of the Rupert Murdoch Group which envisaged a total revenue running upto as much as US $ 27.1 million", said Sumathipala who sounded the dire straits by urging the need to `cut the coat according to the cloth' with the board having to foot out a sum of US $ 768,000 damages plus US $ 440,000 as arbitration costs. The financial drain would resultantly leave his team needing sometime to come up with a vibrant development plan on line with 6 of the 10 cricketing playing countries. Saying that `my committee will have to take the priorities right and take the game forward', Sumathipala announced that in Aravinda's charge would be the tall task of giving muscle to the cricket development work revolving around the school structure while the important area of the coaching committee would also come under the purview of the former master bastman who rated among the top five in the world during his time. The selection committee would be headed by Lalith Kaluperuma and could in all probability be beefed up by another selector to the current 4-member committee while a national development committee would also take top billing. Theming on fitness, an area which once saw him controversially out of the Sri Lankan team, Aravinda said that applications had been called for so as to `implement the physiotherapy side'. "We've got to look at the structure in doing so", he alaborated. On the topic of coaches, de Silva, while noting that as of now the need of the hour was a foreign coach, Lankan cricket needed to look at the day when we would be able to have our own local coaches doing the job. For this a competitiveness had to be created like among the cricketers so that the best grain would emerge to be fine tuned from school level and so on to the highest levels. |
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