Gemstones surface in flushing flood erosion

SL squad for Australia Tests:
Angelo Mathews (capt), Dinesh Chandimal (vice-capt), Dimuth Karunaratne, Kaushal Silva, Kusal Janith Perera, Kusal Mendis, Dhananjaya de Silva, Roshen Silva, Nuwan Pradeep, Vishwa Fernando, Asitha Fernando, Rangana Herath, Dilruwan Perera, Lakshan Sandakan, Suranga Lakmal
[cricinfo]

If the word mismatch needs an example, look forward for the test series of Sri Lanka vs Australia. When we were at peak with experience and numbers in our ranks and they were at the rock bottom with juveniles, they still outplayed us in tests. When both seesaws changed its sides the gap may rise to a mount Everest. If that gap is not enough, SL sinks further with injuries to Prasad, Chameera, Vandersay and omission of Shaminda Eranga due to health and legalities.

The squad comes with many new faces and some surprises in non-selection. Noticeably, the top seven batters are pretty much predictable except for one lower order slot. Without the recent trials of Thiri, Mili and Shanaka either of the new players Roshen Silva or Dhananjaya De Silva is set to play in that. Kusal Mendis and Dinesh Chandimal have potential for some surprises. If Angelo regains his form, and openers do their defending bit at their best, you can hope for something. Kusal Perera can single-handedly win games, but he may need some time to find the game after ICC chased him to Siberia.

Roshen Silva averages 50.8 after 87 first class matches and that first class average is surpassed by only Angelo of all the SL players I can think of. Averaging more than Sanga, Mahela, Aravinda, or Thilan in first class after a reasonable period is seriously a bright factor, but you have this difficulty in interpreting what is meant by Sri Lankan first class which is played in below par conditions. Nevertheless it is unique, and if you consider that nearly a third of his first class innings are 50+ and he bats mostly in middle or lower middle, you may think he is an year-overdue solution for the problem.

In bowling there is a high likelihood that two Fernandos may sit back leaving regular pacemen to lead bowling.I personally think that the bowling in England was too conventional and there was no real attacking fast bowler. 18 year old Asitha Fernando may not be as fast as the grown ups but he may add that difference. However chances are high that they'd stick to the conservative solution.

Rangana's partner would be an interesting debate as Dilruwan is itching for a chance and Lakshan Sandakan looks equally competitive with his chinaman magic. Dilruwan is the third player with 30- average (take 40 wickets as minimum condition) behind the big two, hence deserving the slot. But a chinaman is as rare as that.

Of the non-selection, there will be debate over the drop of Milinda and Dasun Shanaka. Milinda misses selection with innings of 1, 68, 42, 35, 29, 62, 26, 0 and 35 and pretty effective bowling. Shanaka didn't get a fair chance for batting but his bowling created perhaps the only moment that SL was in control in England. Lack of their part-time bowling means that injury-prone Angelo is the only option other than the main bowlers. Nevertheless Thirimanne's name will get an standing ovation for getting dropped from the list.

Aussies are likely to play the the star of the practice game Steve O'Keefe instead of Marsh for their fifth bowler/all-rounder. They have five players averaging 49+ with bat, and bowlers of all variations. Lyon's offbreak combined with O'Keefe left arm orthodox may be like poison for spin-allergic SL batsmen. If that is not enough Starc shoots canon balls of150+.

Sri Lanka has beaten Australia only once in a test, and that win came with injuries to Steve Waugh and Gillespie which left them two men less in the second innings. A win this time is hardly an expectation but a national celebration. Hence any matches drawn can be considered equal to victory. Even in the case of total whitewash by them, I'd like to focus on individual performances as at this time what really matters is where we will be in 2-3 years time, not now. Let's pick gem stones as the flood gates open in Kandy on the 26th.

Seekkuge Prasanna should not listen to commentary pundits

Cricket pundits have always put Sri Lanka into the Appendix of their best practices manual. If the game is a conventional warfare, Sri Lanka is the biological and chemical versions of it. A passion for unorthodox styles, debate and controversy over regulations, Sri Lankan cricket is the do-not-try-at-home style cricket that no coach would like to teach the juveniles with. Seekkuge Prasanna did not add to any controversy but he masters another brand of power hitting and unorthodox style of his own.

His style is exactly against what David Lloyd, Shane Warne and other grandpas of the game advice behind the microphone - settle down, look at the total, plan for fifty overs, build your innings, build partnerships.

To the heck of it. The spinner turned pinch hitter who will turn don’t-know-what-to-call is only concerned about one thing. Hit every bloody ball thrown at him, try to clear the rope every time you hit it. For his brand of cricket a Four is a mere byproduct. Scoreboard does not exist as well as the rest of the surroundings but the ball. So much about cricket being a game of bat and ball, for Prasanna it is all that much.

I enjoyed his 59 as well as 94 in previous game. I wouldn’t expect it everyday, for he is full of weaknesses to take such a dangerous ride successfully often, but many failures will be justified by one such knock. Despite calls for ceasefire from commentary box, Prasanna should do what he can do best. If you cannot settle down, just make the most of it until you last. Sri Lanka has realised this as he wasn’t given a permanent slot. Instead he would sit in the auxiliary weapons pile and apply his menace whenever he is called in.

His selection was not well justified going by stats. However Prasanna has proved his point about his batting more than his bowling. In the past Prasanna’s bowling has been so good at the early stage of the innings, but always fell apart at the end. At Trent Bridge he walks away as the best bowler of the side and hopefully the confidence gained in power hitting raised his bowling talents.

Yet, what Sri Lanka lacked at Trent Bridge was another spinner - a permanent full time one. With Herath retiring, Senanayake destroyed in remedial action, and as per some news, Jeffery Vandersay being injured, the only option they brought was Randiv (Dilruwan seems to be banished into a Siberia of Test cricket). No matter who, it is just what they lacked, in a game of a sea-saw where fortune changed sides every ten overs. England’s last four wickets amassed nearly 200 runs as Sri Lanka had no variation but so many wicket to wicket pace bowlers who only differed in speed. England had packed a team where all can bat with one time opener Plunkett was their no 10. Sri Lanka is a long way from learning death bowling from the scratch. So the control and attack should be done in the middle overs.

The other debate of team selection is Upul Tharanga. Let me wear a pair of gloves as I am gonna open a can of worms of Sri Lanka Cricket. There had been three big controversies in ODI cricket in recent past, by three human names. They are called UpulTharanga, Ajantha Mendis and Ferveez Maharoof. The similarity they shared was that all three players are exceptionally talented and they can win games almost single handed. However among the ones they win, they show unbelievable weaknesses that they destroy the games single handed again.

Tharanga has 13 ODI centuries where the entire rest of the team has a sum of 7, and both Ajantha and Maharoof average  21+ and 27+ in bowling, but that does not justify the odd mistakes they make and loss they register for Sri Lanka. I am not supporting or against their selection. It has always been a touch and go decision, and I suppose it will remain so for the remaining few years of their career. And so will the controversy be.

However, you cannot blame Tharanga for the timid dismissal considering that veteran opener who takes some time to settle down was sent in as a no 7. Only way I can rationalise Tharanga’s selection as a spare opener, only useful in case top order collapses. If we lost many wickets in first few overs he’d go in as a new “opener” and do his bit. Otherwise he’d just be a spare wheel hanging on the backdoor, which made the team only a 10 players "eleven".

I think they should play a lower order batsman in his place. Tharanga should only play in top four if he is better than any of them. The only remaining batsman is Lahiru Thirimanne, whose ODI track record in lower order is not as bad as his current outlook. But whom Sri Lanka missed yesterday was Milinda Siriwardena. If we had Miliinda for Tharanga he could have done the both bits when they were 188/5 in 33rd over and also when England was 82/6 in 19th over. If anyone should be sent in as replacement for Shaminda Eranga it should be Milinda. Sure we don’t need another paceman as the squad has an extra paceman and we were one paceman too many yesterday too.

I notice the need for another spinner and a proper lower order batsman making way for Tharanga and one of the pacemen. Leaving that as the critic point, I wish to admit that England played to their glory last night among a dumbstruck eleven Sri Lankans, who had no control of the game at critical stages. The game was a tie, but the victory was for England.

Should Chandi bat at no 6?

The test that pre-maturely ended in Chester-le-Street yesterday was a pretty good start for Sri Lanka. It was the first time the young team put together a fight against a major team with their bats. Loss was already decided on second day, and there is no need to lament on that - it was England in England [like New Zealand in New Zealand]. Death was written all over when we lagged 397 runs as we followed on. But the fact that they made England bat again, and gave them some target to bat for, is amazing. Brilliant Chandimal knock with contributions from few others, especially from Herath

However I've gotta say that if not for fielding mishaps both sides won't get that far. So we've gotta wait and see whether it was a fluke or not. 

In the past I thought Chandimal should be batting at no 4, even when he made his debute as a no 7 wicket keeper batsman. He had every feature of a no 4. But... after few years now, I think he lacks one such feature. That is his average as a no 4. 

Chandi blossoms well at No 6, especially when everything is going wrong. I think he helped SL many times to get out of the pits we jumped into at that lower middle order position. Both his 126 yesterday and 162 against India (shifted due to a night watchman, mind you) came at no 6. He averages 35 at no 4 compared to 45 overall. His no 6 position average is staggering 85 with four out of six centuries. 

More importantly his absence in lower order has seen the team collapsing often, since no recovery player has been groomed thus far.

So I think he should be given what he does best at no 6. No 4 should be given to another stylish batter perhaps fresh out of school. Or perhaps Angelo Mathews.

In the meantime Shaminda Eranga is reported. So does that mean that we're playing Dasun Shanaka in the next test? Eranga didn't bowl that well either.

Also another selection question. Kusal Perera is available, so who will sit out? Obviously it should be Thirimanne, but it seems that SL cricket pundits have given him a slot no matter what he does.

Bored in the sorrow of defeat here are some stats to read (even statistics are more interesting than cricket nowadays). 

Test Batting:

	# Total Matches	# Players with 10000+ test runs	# Players with 5000+ test runs	# Players with 50+  averages (min of 20 innings)	# Players with 40+ averages (min of 20 innings)	Years taken to produce 10000+ player **
ENG	969	1	21	9	49	139
AUS	788	3	18	11	48	116
WI	513	2	12	8	26	76
IND	495	3	10	5	20	55
NZL	408	-	5	-	11	-
SA	400	1	7	5	18	120
PAK	395	-	6	4	16	-
SL	245	2	8	1	9	29
ZIM	97	-	-	1	3	-
BAN	93	-	-	1	1	-

** First player crossed 10000 in 1980s. Test cricket was not this frequent, and transport has not been this quick in distant past

Test Bowling:

	# Total Test Matches	# Players with 500+ test wickets	# Players with 300+ test wickets	# Players with 25- averages (min of 10 matches 40 wkts)	# Players with 30-    averages (min of 10 matches 40 wkts)
ENG	969	-	5	19 **	> 50 **
AUS	788	2	4	19 **	> 50 **
WI	513	1	4	7	19
IND	495	1	4	1	8
NZL	408	-	2	2	7
SA	400	-	4	8 **	19 **
PAK	395	-	3	9	17
SL	245	1	3	1	2
ZIM	97	-	-	-	1
BAN	93	-	-	-	-

** In early days with under arm bowling in non-standard pitch conditions bowlers averaged very low.

Sources Wiki and Cricinfo.

Sri Lanka is the third best visitor in England, but this may be my last chance to say that

Sri Lanka is the third best visiting test team in England (after Australia and West Indies), when considering win/loss ratio. Sadly this may be my last chance to say that. We have won 3 and lost 6 tests. Having three more played in next month or so, I'd say that Sri Lanka will have to do extremely beyond their capacity to improve it.

In the mean time Mahela Jayawardena will be happy to have another 50- averaging player in 10000+ club. So far Mahela solely holds the awkward record of averaging 50- with 10000+ runs. Alastair Cook only needs few runs and injury barred, he'll surely get there.

Sanath Jayasuruya has beaten the tropical spin off the coast by creating a whirlwind in his comments of "best bowling side in the world". He wasn't referring to England who has 400+ and 300+ wicket takers. Hope his "best bowlers" will live up to a fraction of master's typically flamboyant whack over all media outlets.


Lahiru Thirimanna averages mere 8.00 in 10 innings against England and still seem to have secured a position for tomorrow. It is the same venue as famous 2014 win, and maybe Angelo will try keeping close to that XI as much as he can.

Typically pre-match interviews are the time that even giants role on ground to be overly humble. But, perhaps insulted by Sanath's claim of "best bowling side", James Anderson already declared that they'll win this 3-0. I thought only M S Dhoni reserves such pre-ordering in world cricket.

James Anderson is the leading wicket taker in the world, whereas Stuart Broad is not far away. England is playing their history's most run accumulator, best wicket accumulator and third best wicket accumulator in one side. Sri Lanka has only two batsmen averaging above 40 to face the challenge, only five batsmen have played more than five tests, Thirimanna being one. Perhaps Rangana's 300 wickets may well be the only celebration among the heartache of a shame.

But against odds... let's hope they'll turn the game in England.