Sri Lanka head coach Mickey Arthur explains his routine during the
coronavirus lockdown, the communication he’s having with the cricketers and why he feels cricket should return.
Sri Lanka head coach Mickey Arthur explains his routine during the coronavirus lockdown, the communication he’s having with the cricketers and why he feels cricket should return.
Mickey Arthur is enjoying his time in Sri Lanka. But the last few weeks have been challenging. With the country witnessing a lockdown due to the coronavirus (COVID19) pandemic, the head coach of the Sri Lanka cricket team has conned himself in a hotel in Colombo.
While he is far away from home and the family, Arthur has ensured that he follows a strict routine. “It’s tough to be honest,” he said. “But I try and follow as much routine as possible. I wake up, hit the gym, go for swimming and then come back and do some work – communicate with the coaches and players.”
Arthur analyses the opposition that Sri Lanka is scheduled to face in the next few months and reads articles that will help him “develop as a coach.”
“I have done a lot of research on my computer,” he said, revealing that when there is no work, he enjoys watching a few series on Netix.
In a chat with Sportstar, the 51yearold opens up on his coaching stint and also explains why it is important to resume cricket “possibly without any spectators.”
With no cricketing activity, how are you keeping the players motivated?
We have got 30 boys and obviously there is a curfew at home. We have guys like Angelo Mathews, Thisara Perera – who have fulledged gyms at their homes – whereas some of the young boys don’t have so much facilities. So, our sta has put together a training programme based on what facilities are available to the players. Our boys are doing their physical training and I am spending a lot of time, communicating with the coaches and support sta and drawing up individual player plans.
Have you started any online classes for the players?
No. The guys are training and I have a lot of communication with them. They have had to share a lot of stu with me, which has allowed me to put the player plan together along with the other coaches. I have shared my thoughts with them, and they have had their inputs. A lot of it has been done on oneonone basis with our players. We are in a phase of unknown. The key factor in this time has been our Whatsapp group, where I send some stimulating piece of reading every other day. I have tried to keep the guys updated with where we sit at this point of time. I have forwarded them any information I have got. We have had a lot of communication and the players have been pretty actively involved in almost turning their games with the coaches, so that when we get back to start, these players are ready to go.
There is a lot of speculation on whether there will be enough cricket this year. What are your thoughts?
Look, I hope we can get as much cricket as we possibly can. Obviously, there is a bigger thing at stake. You obviously go back to player safety et cetera – all that has to be perfect. I do think that there has to be a collective will from all cricket boards to play as much cricket as they can, albeit perhaps without spectators. Otherwise, nancially, every cricket board is going to take some signicant strain, and that inuences players, coaches, support sta, grassroots cricket.
But the fans keep the sport alive. So, how feasible will it be to play in front of empty stands?
It’s certainly not ideal. There is a perception that the fans keep the game going. Yes, the fans play a massive role, but the boards make big money from the television rights – paid by television companies to broadcast the games. So, that’s the money you kind of tap into if you are playing in front of no fans. I have got a simple philosophy. I read people saying that the Australianew Zealand ODI (which was played in closed doors at the Sydney Cricket Ground on March 13 before the coronavirusinduced lockdown came into eect) was like a warmup game. First of all, no game for your country is a warmup game. Secondly, you may feel that nobody is watching you, but I can promise you that world has been starved of international sport on television. So, the eyeballs watching you on television will be massive.
What’s your take on the Twenty20 World Cup? Should it go ahead as per schedule?
My thought is that we should certainly try our hardest to play the T20 World Cup
this year. There are two points: Firstly, it gives a lot of cricket boards their revenue. Secondly, people can’t forget that next year there is another T20 World Cup in India. So, where does this one t in the calendar? I think it is so important for the cricket world that we play the T20 World Cup this year.
You have been coaching in the Asian subcontinent for a while now. How has the experience of coaching teams like Pakistan and Sri Lanka been?
The experience has been incredible. It’s now an open secret that I loved my three years with Pakistan. That experience was amazing. But I loved ve years with South Africa. My stint with Australia ended in tears after 1■ months. Sri Lanka is a total new project for me and I am loving my time in Sri Lanka. It’s a beautiful country and we have some very talented young players. Somebody once said to me, and this is something I always say: As an international cricket coach, you have never coached till you have coached in the subcontinent. I can totally vouch for that. There has been something magical with coaching teams in the subcontinent. I absolutely adore it, I love the challenge of new cultures. It’s been very fullling so far.
How is coaching a team from the subcontinent dierent than coaching a team in South Africa or Australia? What are the things that a foreign coach keeps in mind when he travels to this part of the world?
There are so many cultural dierences. The one key aspect to coaching Pakistan was understanding the religious aspect around it, which is very prominent. It’s understanding the respect level that the young Pakistan players have for the senior players. It’s there in India, too. There is a real respect.
Yes, it is there in Australia or South Africa as well. I try and allow the players to be themselves, because being themselves gives you better results. I like an environment where there are challenges within the right mood. When you get players challenging each other and talking about games and having dierences of opinion, that’s when you start moving the team forward. Those conversations have been tougher in subcontinent than those in the Western world – if you may say so. Those conversations are dier
ent because they are easier had in South Africa or Australia. But because of the respect level and the dierent cultures I nd in the subcontinent, no younger players will challenge a senior player. So, it’s interesting. In some way it’s really good and very respectful. But in other way, to move the team forward, you need to be able to have those conversations as a group.
In Pakistan, you played a key role in creating a pool of talent. How challenging was the task, given the fact that you took over at a time when Pakistan had to play its home games in the United Arab Emirates?
It was tough. When we came in, there was no real structure. So, the rst thing was to give whole cricket a bit of structure. It was important to nd training sessions, nd goals, nd values that the team stood for. It was kind of nding the players who you felt tted the team and then tting those players within your team, so that you could give the team success now, but also attain sustainable success.
Also, I had to keep an eye on what was happening down the lower level. That wasn’t always possible because as I said, the structure was so haphazard in Pakistan. It was tough, but I tried to keep a nger on the pulse in terms of what was happening certainly from the under19 team all the way through.
During your stint, there were two major developments in Pakistan cricket: The team won the Champions Trophy in 2017 and Babar Azam emerged as one of the top batting talents. How do you see that?
I saw Babar Azam grow as a cricketer. That was so important. People had said that Babar Azam cannot play. I ensured that Babar Azam plays every game for Pakistan. He is that good a player. We had to give him the roots to grow and wings to y. We had to give him the time and we are seeing the results now.
Now that you are in Sri Lanka, what are your targets? The team has failed to be consistent in all the three formats. So, what are you doing to ensure that domestic structure keeps a pace with the international standards?
We are trying to implement the national standard. I know Jerome Jayaratne (chief cricket operations ocer, Sri Lanka Cricket)
has played a massive role and has put the highperformance structure in place. It’s important that you have a set method, a set way. It is also important that players know where they exactly stand.
If you look at the rankings now, Sri Lanka should be higher than where they are. We should be changing, particularly in whiteball cricket, where we are ranked seventh or eighth. We should be higher than that.
What has gone wrong?
This happened because of a lack of condence shown in the players. Players came in and after one bad innings they didn’t play again. So, there was continuous chopping and changing in terms of selection. What I have tried to do in the last three months is to create some consistency in selection. So, players know where they stand. They are not chucked out after one poor performance because what happens with that is you get your players playing for themselves and not for the team.
So, we are trying to create a mentality, and I am trying to create a culture of excellence where mediocrity is not accepted. That’s one thing I am tough on. (It is about) the way you prepare – physically, technically and mentally, and the goals that we set. It is about creating a brand that suits our style and players that we have available. We are thinking big. We have got talent, so it’s going to be an exciting journey.
With the lockdown, there is no clarity on the future of World Test Championship. What are your thoughts?
I am part of the ICC Cricket Committee, where I represent the coaches. I think the World Test Championships and the Oneday World Championships – that was to begin around this time – have to happen for international cricket. It gives international cricket context, it gives every game in a bilateral series a context. There is no dead game. Even if the series is won, you are actually playing for championship points. That’s so important. Whether that gets moved out a year or the Future Tours Programme gets changed a little bit to factor in all the lost tournaments and to factor that it might be played over a period of two years, I think it’s very feasible. I would not ever like to see the concept of Test Championships or ODI championships lost because that gives Test cricket and Oneday cricket real relevance now.