Jayaratne asked to continue till April next year
The present Interim cricket coach of Sri Lanka, Jerome Jayaratne is likely to be seconded for his services till the end of the World T-20 Tournament which will be held in India April next year according to cricket’s Interim cricket head, Sidath Wettimuny.
SLC’s cricket’s Interim head told the Sunday Times “At the moment the side is pretty much settled and we do not want to rock the boat in any way. So we are hoping to keep him in charge of the national team will the end of the World T-20 tournament in March/April 2016. The discussions are continuing on the matter and we have not arrived at the final decision as yet” Wettimuny said.
However, it is also learned owing to the volatility of the situation ahead, Jayaratne may opt to stick with as head of coaching, though a majority of the current senior players have made a request to retain his services as the national coach.
This means besides the New Zealand tour which is scheduled to begin in late December, Jayaratne will be charge of the Lankans also for the away tour in India where the team will be involved in 5 ODIs and 3 T-20s and the Asia Cup tournament in Bangladesh just before the big T-20 assignment in April.
Meanwhile the Lankan cricket boss vehemently denied that the minister of Sports Jayasekera has stopped the employment structure changes or he has stopped the SLC cricket kit project which was initiated by the SLC. He said “Up to this moment (Saturday afternoon) I have not received any intimation with regard to these decisions to cancel these moves taken by the SLC. In fact with regard to the decision on the employment structure, the Sports Minister Jayasekera was fully for it.”
Sidath Wettimuny further said that Sri Lanka Cricket is very healthy financially. “Today we have over Rs. 200 million in the bank plus another US$ 4.6 million in reserve with the ICC to come. When we took over the Interim Committee initially in early April, they started with a Rs. 207 million overdraft and owed US$ 7.8 million to the ICC and the Bank of Ceylon. Besides the amount that they owed to the Bank of Ceylon has been brought down to US$ 370,000 and they are planning to settle that shortly”.
Wettimuny also added that in the five months of their operation from an expenditure budget of over Rs. 1.4 billion, nearly 30 per cent is saved. He said “This is a good omen. Financially we will not be strong next year”.