IPL auction exposes Sri Lanka’s cricket deficiencies

Standard of school cricket must improve drastically for Sri Lanka’s national teams to perform better

• Not a single Lankan batsman came under the hammer

By Sa’adi Thawfeeq

The Indian Premier League (IPL) 2024 player auction has been done and dusted and features five Sri Lankan players, which is a good advertisement for a country that is struggling to become a potent force which it once was, in international cricket in all formats.

But the saddest aspect of the auction is that the five Sri Lankans picked by the various franchises are all bowlers – Nuwan Thushara and Dilshan Madushanka (Mumbai Indians), Maheesh Theekshana and Matheesha Pathirana (Chennai Super Kings) and Wanindu Hasaranga (Sunrisers Hyderabad). There is not one single specialist batsman from Sri Lanka who came close to coming under the hammer.

Kusal Mendis who led Sri Lanka in the latter part of the Cricket World Cup entered the auction at a base price of INR 50 lakh but went unsold. He was the only Sri Lankan batter who figured at the auction.

What this sad state of affairs reveals is that Sri Lanka don’t have batsmen good enough to attract attention in the white ball format, which brings us to the moot point why Sri Lanka has been struggling to become a force in this format.

There was a time when Sri Lankan batsmen were in great demand in the IPL. Players like Sanath Jayasuriya, Mahela Jayawardene, Kumar Sangakkara and Tillakaratne Dilshan all made an impression in the Indian franchises with their exceptional batting skills and consistency.

Sri Lanka’s current rankings in white ball cricket – seventh in ODIs and eighth in T20Is is largely due to the batsmen being unable to put enough runs on the board for their bowlers to utilise.

This drawback has been an ongoing malady for the past seven years and does not look like it will be resolved in the near future unless drastic steps are taken to uplift the standard of school cricket. Schools are the cradle of cricket and provide the players for the future. If that database is not producing quality batsmen and bowlers who can perform consistently at international level, then it is certain to filter down to the national team. This is the core issue which no one has taken the trouble to address.

The standard of school cricket is not the same as it was 20-30 years ago. It has declined to the level where it is seldom that you find a quality player emerging. Gone are the days when a schoolboy cricketer would walk into the national side and challenge his skills against top international opposition.

Like what Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) is trying to do to uplift the standard of club cricket in the country by reducing the number of teams competing in the Major League from 26 to 10 teams, the Sri Lanka Schools Cricket Association (SLSCA) must also find a way to ensure that there is strong competition amongst schools where the oppositions are strong and not just average, which is the case in school cricket today. Scoring runs and taking wickets against poor opposition and on pitches favourable to bowling has seen the quality of cricketers coming through the school system drop to drastic levels.

A clear case in point is the Sri Lanka Under-19 cricketers who are finding it difficult to compete at international competitions, because they have not played enough competitive matches where they have to test their skills against strong opposition on good pitches to achieve victory. Instead, wins, runs and wickets have come to them rather easily and when they come up against strong teams at international level they find it difficult to compete. This filters down the system to the developing squads, emerging teams and ‘A’ teams to the national side. 

The national selectors have to pick national sides from what is available, and it is not the best of the best. So it is not surprising that wins in white ball formats are few and far between. 

Past Sri Lanka Under-19 coaches have emphasised the need for the Under-19 cricketers to play cricket at a higher level than school cricket to be able to compete with the rest of the world. Current Coach Jehan Mubarak said that he would like matches arranged against the Sri Lanka ‘A’ team or the national team to pit his charges ahead of next month’s Under-19 World Cup in South Africa. 

Sri Lanka’s school system from the junior level is perhaps by far the best in the world, but that has not been proved at international level where Sri Lanka has yet to win an Under-19 World Cup despite being one of five participants at all 14 tournaments held so far since 1988.