Have Sri Lanka’s Decision-Makers Taken Leave Of Their Senses?
By Emil van der Poorten –July 3, 2016
Emil van der Poorten
While the unprecedented thrashing that Sri Lanka took at the hands of England in a recent 50-50 game may not have been of earth-shaking significance in a world where the Farages, Le Pens, Boris Johnsons and Donald Trumps are exulting at Great Britain’s exit from the European Union, it is symptomatic of where our current government is taking us in the matter of sliding down the slippery slope of equivocation and unprincipled behaviour in dear old Silly Lanka.
Bearing more than a passing connection to the debacle at Edgbaston (?) is the fact that preceding that annihilation was a reported exchange between the skipper of the Sri Lankan side, Angelo Mathews, and the Chief Selector, Sanath Jayasuriya, in the matter of who should be retained on the soil of Blightly and who should be sent back to the shores of Sri Lanka.
Mathews came off second best and, while I do not know whether that fact had any significant bearing on the final outcome of the match (mismatch?) with England, it was certainly of a piece with what has recently been going on in Sri Lankan cricket.
In the matter of “coming events casting their shadows,” was Thilanga Sumathipala being placed in the apex position of Sri Lanka’s most popular sport. His previous stint in this position generated an accusation that an alleged/convicted murderer made his exit from Sri Lanka (never to return?) thanks to the provision of a visa provided by the Cricket Board under blatantly false pretences. The mainstream media of this country, at a time when saying anything even vaguely critical of the Mahinda Rajapaksa (MR1) government and its minions could result in serious bodily harm, went to bat on that one and never, to my recollection, was there so much as an excuse made for this fact, leave alone an official l rebuttal.
Guess who the Maithripala Sirisena/Ranil Wickremesinghe (MR2) government re-installs in the top job in cricket? Need I say it again? Thilanga Sumathipala!
With the return of Mr. Sumathipala one of the first events of any import in our cricket world was the return to the limelight of another of the same ilk – Sanath Jayasuriya.
In case readers’ memories are even shorter than mine, Mr. Jayasuriya was one of the early recruits to an MR1 regime swollen with the euphoria generated by the defeat of the Prabhakaran horde. Not only did he parlay this connection into an overwhelming victory in the south under the MR1 banner, he began demanding Ministerial status under his mentor! Worse yet, one of the less well kept secrets of the time is that he had a cricket career that had certainly passed its “best before” date extended on the orders of The Highest in the Land, resulting in a few more shekels in the Jayasuriya bank account at the expense of our national team carrying a “passenger” on its roster.
