A new set of Cricket selectors on the cards
View(s):A new set of national selectors will be named by Sri Lanka Cricket and ratified by the Minister of Sports very soon.
Both Aravinda de Silva and Kumar Sangakkara have completed their short obligation to the SLC.
A cricket insider told the Sunday Times “Both Aravinda de Silva and Kumar Sangakkara got involved in the process on a short term basis and to tide over a problem that they faced at that time over the selection of the team for the T-20 World Cup, and made it clear that they would not remain in that capacity for long”.
It is that Sangakkara has already moved to Surrey to fulfil his obligations which run up to the 2016 season while de Silva has cited his business obligations. Meanwhile the third selector, Lalith Kaluperuma is on a three-month vacation in Australia and he too would be not available in the immediate future, according to the insider.
This means only Romesh Kaluwitharana and Ranjith Madurasinghe are left in the fray. However at the very outset, it was said that the de Silva led panel will be effective only till the 30th of this month. The insider said “Right now Aravinda is helping us out. He even sat along with us to select the initial squad that is training for the England tour, but, very soon a new set of selectors which includes the two surviving selectors will be named”.
After the ICC T-20 obligations were over, Aravinda de Silva and the other selectors sat to select the initial pool for the tour of England where they will play three Tests matches, five ODIs and a T-20 match. So far in training are 23 players in the Test pool, fifteen in the ODI pool and a few additional players in the T-20 squad.
It is reliably learned that the selectors are not ready to take many chances this time with this tour of England and are contemplating to include some experienced players who are out of the reckoning at the moment.
One such name that has surfaced is the name of opening batsman Tharanga Paranavithana who played his last Test match against New Zealand in November 2012, where he scored 40 and a zero.