Fast bowling depth worries chief selector
The Chairman of Cricket Selectors Pramodya Wickremasinghe admits that the current crop of fast bowlers is far from match-winning and has suggested setting up a Fast Bowling Unit at the HighPerformance Centre focusing on teenage talent to lift fast-bowling standards.
With Suranga Lakmal retired and Dushmantha Chameera being asked to concentrate on the shorter format by the medics to ease a troubled ankle, the Selectors have named a five-man seam attack for the series against Bangladesh. But their lack of experience makes them one of the ‘weakest seam attacks’ ever to be fielded by Sri Lanka in a Test. Also unavailable is Lahiru Kumara. The five seamers have 29 Test matches under their belt with Vishwa Fernando, the left-arm seamer, featuring in more than half of them (16). The other four are Kasun Rajitha, Asitha Fernando, Chamika Karunaratne and uncapped Dilshan Madushanka.
“We have a serious issue,” admits Wickremasinghe, who played 40 Tests for Sri Lanka in the 90s. “This is the best available team and this worries me and my fellow selectors. So we have suggested that we should set up a Fast Bowling Unit at the High-Performance Centre (HPC) and work with teenagers from scratch.”
Wickremasinghe was a member of the World Cup-winning team back in 1996 and played his cricket alongside Chaminda Vaas, the greatest seam bowler Sri Lanka has produced in the longer format (355 wickets). Behind him is Lakmal, who had collected 171 wickets before he retired from international cricket last month.
“I believe we need to put up a united effort where, coaches, doctors, physiotherapists and trainers worked in cohesion to groom a wholesome bowler,” he said. “We have talent in our system but we have not groomed them properly.”
There are multiple reasons for Sri Lanka finds itself in this situation. The finger-pointing as usual extends to domestic cricket, where spin-friendly wickets make seamers ineffective. They requires little contribution from seam bowlers as spinners wreak havoc on helpful pitches. Seam bowlers, too, are reluctant to play Test cricket given the heavy workload as opposed to the hugely popular T20 format.
“One of the biggest issues we have is the injuries and to counter this we need to make them physically strong after analysing their bodies,” Wickremasinghe said. “We then need to make them match fit. This requires them to spend long hours bowling at nets which is not happening at present. The next step is to make them strong mentally so that they are able to play even with injuries as many have done in the past. So we need to work on these aspects and I see that as the only way to build a strong team of fast bowlers.”
Vaas, who played 111 Tests for Sri Lanka--the highest by a Sri Lankan seamer--only missed a Test only once through injury, in stark contrast to the present crop of players who spend more days in recovery and rehab i l i t a t i o n . Wickremasinghe also questions the work of those fast bowling coaches attached to the coaching department.
“What have they done? I think we need evaluate their contribution as coaches too as we are facing a huge crisis now due to dearth of quality fast bowling talent,” Wickremasinghe questioned.
Following the Australian series, Sri Lanka will play Australia at home which includes 2 Tests, 5 ODIs and 3 T20Is.