The inaugural meeting of the Australian cricket team management with the press turned out to be damp squib at Hotel (Lanka) Oberoi when it was initially announced by the manager Cam Battersby that questions would be answered only with regard to the present tour and the future.
As a result, some of the burning questions which the press were eagerly seeking to fire at the visitors never took place.
From the outcome of the press conference it was evident that Australia were determined not to let what happened in the recent past sully the relationships of the two Cricket Boards which according to the Australian Cricket Board's (ACB) chief executive Graham Halbish has been 'good'.
``We got a bit cranky last summer with the two sides (Sri Lanka and Pakistan) because they weren't communicating that well,'' said Australia's newly-appointed captain Ian Healy.
``We will make every endeavour to play as hard. We will play as fair and hard as we can without making a scene for anyone,'' said Healy, who has been known to be a good competitor on the field, but now has the chance to show that he is equally a good diplomat as well.
Healy, only the second Australian wicket-keeper to lead his country after Barry Jarman, installed World Cup champions Sri Lanka as the favourites to win the Singer World Series, but added, that India and Zimbabwe were not going to be that easy either.
``We will certainly try and use the underdog tag and maybe sneak up on Sri Lanka. We will play tough and hard cricket and also make sure we avenge that World Cup defeat,'' he said.
``We may not win every match, but we are gonna try hard to win very tournament,'' said Healy, who acknowledged the fact that Sri Lanka and India were very good one-day sides.
Healy said that he had sufficient replacements for opening batsman and captain Mark Taylor and leg-spinner Shane Warne who both skipped the tour due to injuries.
``Whether they (Darren Lehmann and Brad Hogg) have sufficient experience to fill the vacancies immediately is what we are interested to find out on this tour. You cannot replace such players overnight, but with a little bit of lift from the other players coupled with their potential it will hold them in good stead,'' he said.
Healy described Warne's replacement Hogg as ``a very good star on our horizon''.
``He was picked by the selection panel because he has very good potential with his left-arm chinamen spinners. He is a good batsman who fields brilliantly,'' Healy said.
The Australian captain's one worry is to get his bowlers into good form. With the exception of batsmen Michael Bevan (Yorkshire) and Stuart Law (Essex) both of whom played county cricket in England, the rest of the Australian squad are coming out of a long winter. They have not had any proper match practice since the Wills World Cup ended in March.
The Australians hope to make use of today's and tomorrow's practice games against the Sri Lanka Colts XI and the President's XI to obtain good practice and obviously, a result. The venue of both matches have been changed to the Police Park, Bambalapitiya for security reasons.
Security has been Australia's main concern, but on this tour so far (they arrived on Tuesdsay night) they have beeen very satisfied with the arrangements.
``There was a level of reservation coming here, but the hospitality and warm reception we got from the Sri Lankans has gone a long way to dispel those fears,'' said Healy.
``We are well and truly on the way to a happy tour,'' he said.
``We found reason to take a decision to come to Sri Lanka this time in a different light from the World Cup,'' said Halbish.
``We must acknowledge the efforts made by the new Sri Lanka Cricket Board administrators over the past five or six months. They made many contacts which have all been positive,'' he said.
Unfortunately, not a single Cricket Board official was present at the press conference to savour the plaudits heaped on them by the ACB.