Dilshan pressured to retire
SRI Lanka’s Tillakaratne Dilshan will quit international cricket after the limited-overs series against Australia, the swashbuckling opener announced yesterday.
“I have decided to retire from the ODIs after the third match in Dambulla (on Sunday), and will play the two Twenty20s and then retire completely,” Dilshan said.
After the conclusion of the five-match ODI series, Sri Lanka and Australia will play two Twenty20 matches on September 6 and September 9.
Inventor of the famous “Dilscoop” ramp shot, Dilshan played the last of his 87 Tests in 2013 before quitting the longer format with 5 492 runs and 39 wickets.
A wily off-spinner and one of the most agile Sri Lankan fielders even at the age of 39, Dilshan scored 22 and 10 in the first two one-dayers of the ongoing five-match series against world champions Australia.
“I, together with my committee, wish to extend our sincere appreciation and wish him the very best in his future endeavours,” said Sri Lanka Cricket president Thilanga Sumathipala.
According to media reports, the former captain was persuaded to retire as Sri Lanka build a new team under Angelo Mathews with an eye on the 2019 World Cup.
Dilshan made his one-day debut against Zimbabwe in 1999 and went on to play 329 ODIs, amassing 10 248 runs that included 22 hundreds, with an 86-plus strike rate.
He has also scored 1 884 runs in 78 Twenty20 Internationals, and was Sri Lanka’s top scorer in this year’s World Twenty20 in India.
His retirement comes in the wake of significant pressure from Sri Lanka’s selectors.
Dilshan’s own performance has been outstanding over the past few years – he averages 49.18 in ODIs since the start of 2013, and had his most successful ODI year last year, when he scored 1 207 runs at an average of 52.47.
But with Angelo Mathews and the selectors now seeking to build a team for the 2019 World Cup, Dilshan was persuaded to retire.
He was also Sri Lanka’s top scorer in this year’s World T20 campaign.
Dilshan missed the England tour earlier this year owing to personal reasons, and was seen in discussion with chief selector Sanath Jayasuriya before the ODI series against Australia.
He is understood to have expressed a reluctance to retire, but having scored 22 and 10 in the first two matches, has since changed his mind.
Dilshan was a late bloomer at the top level. Having batted largely in the lower middle order for almost a decade since his debut in 1999, he blossomed as a limited-overs batsman when he became a consistent opener in 2009.
Dilshan scored 1 000 or more ODI runs in a calendar year four times since being sent permanently up the order, and never failed to amass fewer than 800 runs between 2009 and last year.
He was the fourth Sri Lanka batsman, after Jayasuriya, Kumar Sangakkara and Mahela Jayawardene, to cross 10 000 ODI runs.
He has also been one of the premier T20 players over the past six years. Dilshan top-scored in the 2009 World T20, where Sri Lanka made the final, before going on to become the second-highest run-scorer overall in T20 internationals – playing in two more World T20 finals, one of which his team won.
He is one of a handful of batsmen to have hit centuries in all three formats of the game. He alone plays the shot colloquially known as the “Dilscoop”, in which a length ball is uniquely deflected over the keeper.
Dilshan captained Sri Lanka across formats between May 2010 and January 2012, and was an effective bowler in the limited-overs format.
His off-spin has brought him 106 ODI wickets at an average of 44.84. – Reuters-cricinfo