Cricket World Cup and Sri Lanka’s chances

The 50-over ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup – held once every four years – got underway yesterday in India. Sadly, it is the first world cup that is held without the participation of the West Indies, who dominated international cricket in the days gone by as well as were the winners of the first two editions of the coveted competition.

The World Cup final will be played at Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad, Gujarat – the home state of the Indian Prime Minister. It is the largest cricket stadium in the world and will also host the keenly anticipated India-Pakistan clash for which the hotel rooms in Ahmedabad have already been fully booked. This is the first time the Pakistani national cricket team has visited their neighbours since 2016. The two teams have not played any bilateral cricket for more than a decade due to the geopolitical tensions between both countries.

Oozing with confidence on the back of the success of Chandrayaan-3, the BJP followers would be fervently hoping for India to win the grand tournament, as it would raise the feel-good factor among the cricket-loving Indians before Lok Sabha elections next year. The obsession with the game is quite astonishing in the subcontinent and the unprecedented fascination provides the space for the governments to implement unpopular measures such as tax hikes and price increases. One day before the 2011 World Cup Final between Sri Lanka and India, the then Mahinda Rajapaksa Government raised fuel and gas prices when the entire nation was engrossed with the captivating battle.

Although the 50-over World Cup was considered as the pinnacle of international cricket, the emergence of T20 Cricket and preponderance of T20 franchise leagues across the globe have diluted the 50-over format. Swashbuckling, South African Wicket-Keeper batsman Quinton De Kock has already announced that he will be retiring completely from international cricket after the World Cup in order to earn more money by taking part in franchise-based T20 leagues. In a column to the Cricinfo website, former Australian Captain Ian Chappell had criticised the administrators of the sport for diminishing the value of one-day cricket by giving more preference towards T20 cricket. Not only one-day cricket, even the prominence of entire international cricket will surely be tested by the financially lucrative T20 league competitions in the times to come.

At any time a one-day cricket world cup is taking place, Sri Lankans fondly recall their greatest glory in sports – 1996 World Cup victory. Also, cricket becomes a prominent talking point within the public discourse when a world cup is being played. People also expect their team to show a commendable performance during the world cup, and any poor performance is responded to by criticism filled with emotion and anger. Nevertheless, it is quite apparent that Sri Lanka’s chances of qualifying for the semi-finals, let alone winning the trophy are very slim. Even to feature in this tournament, the team had to play a qualifier round. The absence of Dusmantha Chameera and Wannindu Hasaranga is a massive blow to the side’s prospects. Already, the team has lost to Bangladesh and Afghanistan – who are ranked below Sri Lanka in ODI rankings – in warm-up matches. The middle-order batting does not look promising at all while Dasun Shanaka’s batting form is a huge worry.

Our performance in one-day cricket has been below par since 2015. Even though we were the trend setters in ODI cricket during the ’90s, it is obvious that our cricket team has not evolved with modern-day ODI cricket. Once this world cup is over, it would be prudent for the cricket authorities to go for a comprehensive review of our performance in ODI cricket over the last eight years and make progressive changes in order to become a dominant force in one-day cricket like in the past.