Gridlock over national cricket selection committee appointments

By Sa’adi Thawfeeq

Currently there seems to be an administrative impasse in appointing the right people to form the national cricket selection committee with names being thrown around, some of them even without the consent of the individuals.

Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) is supposed to have submitted five names as replacement for the men’s section of the selection committee but the SLC constitution – to the best of my knowledge – allows only five members in its selection committee. So, the SLC currently having a seven-member selection committee with letters of appointment is in violation of the constitution.

The Sports Law clearly states the committee should comprise a three-member or five-member selection committee.

If Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) is going to bring the national selection committee in line with the Sports Law, by having only one selection committee to oversee men’s, women’s and junior cricket, they must also stand by its constitution.

At present there is a six-member committee, with one member having resigned after the England Test series, holding onto letters of appointment with some of them not having even sat at a selection committee meeting. So how on earth are they going to be removed?

That is why the National Sports Selection Committee seems to be in a quandary and taking days to make the decision. It appears that people within the system being repeatedly recycled.

Amongst the five names SLC we reliably learn has sent to the National Sports Selection Committee are Romesh Kaluwitharana, a failed A team coach; Hemantha Devapriya, another failed women’s team coach; and former selector Pramodya Wickramasinghe, who served under Sanath Jayasuriya’s selection committee and who once when removed after the 2015 World Cup had gone on record stating that there was no talent in the country. The responsibility vested in a selector is to find the talent, harness it and get them to perform for the country.

Wickramasinghe has also made allegations accusing the national cricket team – which comprises some of the current players – of “unnatural match patterns” and player selections. Two past Sports Ministers – Faiszer Musthapha and Harin Fernando – both rejected his name when he was nominated to the selection panel because of those allegations made against the players.

Ranjith Madurasinghe, another member of the current selection panel, has been in charge of under 19 cricket for the last 4-5 years and we have plummeted to 10th in the rankings.

One does not need to represent the country in over 100 internationals to qualify as a national selector or its chairman. A glowing example is (MSK) Mannava Prasad, until recently the chief selector of the Indian national cricket team, who played only six Tests for his country but picked the side that went onto create headlines by defeating a full-strength Australian team 2-1 in the recently concluded Test series in Australia.

Since this is a crisis situation it is the responsibility of two former national captains, Mahela Jayawardene (head of National Sports Council) and Kumar Sangakkara (member of National Sports Council), to come into the selection committee for the series against West Indies, only as there is a precedent to a one-month selection committee being appointed. Five years ago, the selection committee headed by Kapila Wijegunawardene was sacked and in their place was installed a kangaroo court selection committee headed by Aravinda de Silva for one month.

Since there are so many things to be rectified in this case, Sangakkara or Jayawardene could accompany the team to the West Indies as a tour selector, and mentor the players to do the right thing. Jayawardene mentored England batsmen during their Test series against Pakistan in 2015 and was rehired as a coaching consultant by England for the 2016 T20 World Cup.

The Sports Minister should understand that it with his legacy that he is toying with, because after successive Sports Ministers, like Navin Dissanayake, Dayasiri Jayasekera, Faiszer Musthapha and Harin Fernando, had a golden opportunity to do the right thing, they floundered and now they are subject to public ridicule for not doing so.

The decision the Sports Minister makes is going to be his legacy. Being a young politician, he also has a classic example of how his father Mahinda Rajapaksa managed things, understanding the dynamics of cricket by not allowing riff-raff to enter even through an electoral portal. He did so with soaring success, with cricket flourishing to a point where we went to five ICC World Cup finals, which no other country can boast of other than Australia who have a far superior infrastructure.