Sri Lanka need more grounds to play international matches

by Sajeewa JAYAKODY

CRICKET: When Sri Lanka tour New Zealand, England, South Africa or Australia, the Lankan batsmen face an uphill task to score runs easily. When the ball is moving in the cold atmosphere in England or in New Zealand, or when our batsmen bat on fast and bouncy Australian and South African pitches, they struggle to make runs unlike on the sub-continent surfaces. It is the same for our bowlers, too, as they are unable to take wickets when they play in those conditions.

Recently, when Sri Lanka 'A' team toured Zimbabwe for two unofficial four-day Test matches and Tri-Nation 50-over tournament, which also involved South Africa 'A', they were unable to win a single match or to perform upto expected standards.

However, a majority of players who had gone on the tour were ones who had scored heavily and taken lot of wickets in the recently concluded Premier 'A' and 'B' Division matches. They lost all the four limited over matches and lost one unofficial Test match.

One Test was drawn.

Both batsmen and bowlers failed to adapt to the conditions. This has been a familiar story, especially when it comes to 'A' tours to countries such as England, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand.

The senior squad consists of experienced players who have played in these conditions a lot and who are capable of adapting to conditions offered. However, they too struggled to master such conditions at times as shown by their performance during recent tours to such countries. This poses the question whether the conditions (especially the pitch conditions) our players confront during domestic tournaments are adequate as against the pitches abroad.

In Sri Lanka, there is an authority on getting wickets ready for international matches. He is former top cricketer Anuruddha Polonowita, who has enough experience of getting wickets ready for international matches.

Polonowita said that there are 20 clubs that play cricket, but there are only 10 grounds to play matches or to have practices. So, the country's few international cricket grounds have to be used for club matches as well as for the school big matches.

Polonowita said that unlike other countries, Sri Lanka use the same wicket for several matches per year. It is difficult to maintain a high standard when a pitch is over used. So the curators have to prepare the pitch within two months before an international fixture.

Lack of grounds

"As there is a lack of cricket grounds in Sri Lanka, the pitches have become over used. When we take SSC grounds, it is used for school big matches and club matches.

But in other countries, for example, in England, Australia, New Zealand or in South Africa, it can be seen that only one Test match is played per year (in the summer). So, the authorities have enough time to prepare the grounds and they have good time to maintain the strips," said National Curator Anuruddha Polonowita.

According to the ICC cricket calendar, Sri Lanka are given home matches during the winter of European countries. In Sri Lanka, we get matches in our two monsoon seasons. Subsequently it becomes our off season.

So, it is difficult to protect the surfaces from frequent rain. We deploy about 100 ground staffers to attend to the ground preparations and also have the playing strip ready for play. So, it is a big task, said Polonowita.

"Lack of good grounds has been somewhat of a drawback for Sri Lanka. There are only a few international cricket grounds in Sri Lanka. They are R Premadasa Stadium, Dambulla Stadium, Galle Stadium, P Sara Stadium and the SSC grounds. We must pay tribute to President Mahinda Rajapaksa for his bold decision to build two new cricket grounds in Hambantota and Pallekele for the past ICC World Cup in 2011," said Polonowita.

"The President has really helped us a great deal. I was given the authority to get up the Hambantota and Pallekele strips from the inception and the former R Premadasa Stadium surface has been done up to accommodate the matches by elevating the grounds three and a half feet before the World Cup 2011.

We achieved our target, preparing quality cricket pitches within that short period," said Polonowita who has prepared 65 Test pitches and over 145 ODI pitches during his 18-year service as the National Curator. "We prepare grassy pitches in our seven international grounds.

The outfield blue grass is imported from Australia and the blue grass we use on the strip, is taken from General Cemetery, Borella," said smiling Polonowita.

However, Sri Lanka re-wrote cricket history at Khettarama Stadium by scoring massive 952 runs for six wickets against India in August 1997 with the world record partnership of 574 runs for the second wicket with Sanath Jayasuriya (340) and Roshan Mahanama (225).

Mahela - Sangakkara 624 runs for 3rd wkt

Subsequently, Mahela Jayawardene (374) and Kumar Sangakkara (287) went for that world record, scoring 624 runs against South Africa for the third wicket at the SSC grounds in July 2006 in another match. Those batting records show us the good quality of the Sri Lankan pitches. Sri Lanka have a 80 percent winning percentage of their home matches. World renowned bowlers like Chaminda Vaas and Muttiah Muralitharan claimed most of wickets playing on home pitches. Sri Lanka constructed one of the largest grounds for cricket in Hambantota for the past ICC World Cup. The cricket commentators praised both wickets in Hambantota and Pallekele. In the recently concluded Test match against Pakistan in Pallekele, playing strip lasted to the fifth day. But unfortunately, Sri Lanka were unable to reach the 276 target in 71 overs.

Curator Department formed

After assuming duties as Sri Lanka's National Curator, Polonowita established the Curator Department for the first time in Sri Lanka. At the moment, seven Agriculture graduates have been deployed to SLC to control grounds. Anuruddha Polonowita was an effective all-rounder being a fine left-arm spinner and a useful middle-order batsman. He captained Ananda College in 1957. After leaving school, he turned out for SSC and Nomads. He also represented Sri Lanka with distinction in the 1960s and early 1970s. He produced two world class captains - Arjuna Ranatunga and Marvan Atapattu with 24 Test and ODI players from Ananda College during his 38-year coaching tenure at the school.