Focus on 2023 World Cup India
Cricket's brain centre
As I enter his room at the Sri Lanka Cricket headquarters in Maitland Place, Asanka Gurusinha, the Chief Cricket Operations Manager, was on the phone with Head Coach Chandika Hathurusingha and Chief Selector Graeme Labrooy. The discussion centered on the three-match Test series against England and how their bowling unit had not had sufficient workload in training.
Suranga Lakmal, Dilruwan Perera and Lahiru Kumara hadn’t bowled enough in nets due to rainy weather, Gurusinha said, and that this was a concern ahead of an important Test series. “We do not want to bowl them in the indoor nets,” he reflected, seated overlooking the new ‘Brain Center’ he manages. “And it’s that workload we are worried about.”
“Even if you take batsmen, they pretty much bat indoors,” he continued. “The weather has not been helpful. There are about six or seven guys who are not in the one-day side but play lots of domestic white ball cricket at present. So we need these guys to focus on red ball cricket as the series against England begins in just two weeks.”
This is part of Gurusinha’s job as Head of Cricket Operations, a position newly created to manage the High Performance Center, Brain Center and international and women’s cricket. In short, he is supposed to help shape the future of the country’s game along with a number of coaches attached to the High Performance Center and analysts working at the Brain Center. Since taking over, he has been working on getting the right structure in place to help player production line and he believes the results will come in two to three years.
Asanka Grusinghe
“My focus during the last six months was to get the right structure and staff in place,” he explained. “Because if you have the right structure and staff, the results will follow. We have a very good coaching staff working with players at the High Performance Center and another team working here at the Brain Center, capturing data and analyzing them for coaches and players to understand their strengths and weaknesses, as well as those of opposing teams.”
Earlier this year, SLC adopted an advanced software used by Spanish football giants Barcelona to manage its injury-prone cricketers as they look to restore Sri Lanka’s prestige on the world stage after several months of poor performances at international cricket. This, coupled with a match analysis system developed in-house, means Sri Lanka has the most sophisticated player management technology of any cricketing nation.
“We have managed to reduce injuries substantially,” says Gurusinha. “Of course, they will always occur but we have invested in a tool for early detection. It helps us identify if a player is in a red zone, a danger zone, or not. If a player is in the red zone due to overwork, we need to reduce his workload. And if he is in the red zone due to less work, we need to increase his workload by pushing him through fitness and fielding sessions.”
“When a player is in the red zone, we convey it straightaway to the team management and we look at how we can take them to an acceptable level,” he explained. “It may be couple of days of complete rest from training, or work with the massage therapist, physios, or even few swimming sessions for recovery. In the West Indies, where our fast bowlers did lot of bowling, we didn’t even ask the fast bowlers to come for training. They just stayed at the hotel, because the important thing was recovery. The red zone means there’s a high risk. It doesn’t necessarily mean he is going to get injured.”
The identification is presently done through a GPS system which the players now wear during training and matches to monitor fitness levels and performance.
“This GPS unit helps us measure their workload,” Gurusinha said. “If a player is doing a session wearing the GPS unit, we can measure the intensity and speed with which a player is performing.”
But have these sophisticated systems lifted the national team’s performance? No. Gurusinha agrees that no tool can help with what you are going to do in the middle.
“The Board can give everything possible but it’s up to the players out in the middle to execute what they have gathered through the various tools,” he said. “We cannot programme a player. That’s where (Chandika) Hathurusingha is working very, very hard.”
Execution is up to the players. “That’s where we need to improve a lot more,” he reiterated. “I know this team is capable of doing that. I know confidence is low in one-day cricket but I think its couple of games till we get up and start running. It’s not a lie that our batting has not clicked. Every game we have won; we have lost about two wickets within the first 20 overs. But in games we have lost, we lost nearly five wickets in the first 20 overs. I don’t think any side in the world can win a game if they lose five wickets within the first 20 overs, sometimes in the first 15 overs.”
Gurusinha believes that even though there is no immediate impact, results will come in two to three years. “Initially, I wasn’t sure how it would work,” he admitted. “But I am confident this will have results. What we are doing here today, you will see results in two to three years because we are collecting a lot of data right now. For an instance, the Indian U-19 team was here and we collected data. We had a data analyst working with them. They might be playing for India in two years. So this is what we are trying to do: collect data and build this database. The Brain Center is helping us to build our younger generation.”
This younger generation, he thinks, will put Sri Lanka in a better footing when the 2023 World Cup nears. For now, the 2019 World Cup looks a distant dream for the 1996 winners as they struggle to climb out of the deep rut they have fallen into over the last two years. Sri Lanka, who are on the verge of another series defeat against England, have lost four of their last five matches with the other being washed out.
“When you look at all the stats, I believe we will have a very good side by 2023 when the tournament plays in India,” Gurusinha said. “We have lots of players between the ages of 20 and 23. By the time the 2023 World Cup nears, these guys will have at least 100 to 150 ODIs and at least 50-60 Tests matches behind them. This, I am sure, will make Sri Lanka one of the most competitive sides in world cricket, come 2023. We are on the right track.”
Commenting on the 2019 World Cup, Gurusinha says the team management has a huge challenge to get the players ready by next year.”The next three tours are the toughest for us and injury management of the fast bowlers are going to be a major concern,” he said. As part of team’s strategy to keep the bowlers free from injury, Gurusinha said they might rest some players during the Australian series.
“There’s only two Test matches but that request should come from the coach and the Chairman of Selectors as to how they want to manage them,” Gurusinha said. “The game has changed so much. The intensity and speed with which they play now are very high than when we played. I think the players need rest now and that will help them focus.”
The next three tours are the toughest Sri Lanka face leading up to the World Cup. At the conclusion of the current series against England, they will travel to New Zealand where they will play two Tests, three ODIs and a T20 before heading to Australia for a two-match Test series. This will be followed by a full series to South Africa–three Tests, five ODIs and a T20–Sri Lanka’s last bilateral encounter prior to the World Cup in May.
“These series will help us in a big way,” Gurusinha says. “If you do well against those three sides, the team will be at a different level of confidence which will help us in England. Yes, there are a lot of ‘ifs’ at this stage and I am hoping those ‘ifs’ will go off by the Australian series. We should have a settled team when we go to South Africa.”
But the 52-year-old believes Sri Lanka’s cricketers have what it takes to win a World Cup although current performance suggests otherwise. He has been in constant touch with the national team management, particularly with Head Coach Hathurusingha and selectors, giving them valuable data-based information to help prepare the team for the tournament in England.
‘Look, I think even in 1996, we lost the Test series in Australia but we came back to beat both Australia and West Indies to reach a tri-series final and that confidence was good enough for us to go to the World Cup and do it,” he recalled. “Of course, two different teams played in two different eras. It was a very, very experienced team in 1996 compared to the current team here, but in terms of skill, these guys are way ahead in a lot of areas.”
Gurusinha admitted it is vital to have a settled batting unit with their roles and positions defined to boost the level of confidence of players.
“Personally, for me, I need that stable position and I am sure all our players want that,” he reflected. “I think Hathu (Hathurusingha) is still trying to see what’s the best combination. He is not looking at the current series but his focus is the World Cup in England. Hopefully by then, we will be in a better position. But personally I believe we should have a stable team and a settled batting unit.”