Where are Sri Lanka mentally after the Wanderers Test debacle?
Pat Symcox - 12 November 2002
The World Cup 2003 is surely uppermost in the mind of the coach and captain and part of the preparation was to land in South Africa and prepare the team mentally for the challenges that lay ahead next year. The tour to South Africa would have been seen as a wonderful opportunity to get some valuable practice in and to formulate a strategy with the senior players. Every team in World cricket would have jumped at the chance to have a head start by playing under these testing conditions without the pressure of the World Cup being at stake. Somehow, in a matter of three eventful days at the Wanderers, certain dreams and aspirations have been rocked to the core.
The batting was woeful throughout. At no stage did any batsman look like dominating the bowlers or mastering the conditions. Throughout the previous tour to South Africa, the Sri Lankan team showed a clear inability to adjust their techniques to meet the local conditions. Clearly nothing has changed. The top five still cannot score when faced with deliveries that target the area between the hip and Shoulder area. The reluctance to get forward and nullify any late swing is obvious to all who care to watch. Cricket is about absorbing and transferring of pressure and to do that batsmen have to score runs off bad deliveries. The Sri Lankan batsmen let them go. The unbelievable averages that some of the batsmen boast seems totally out of kilter with their ability to play the game outside of their own backyard. While some players are more equipped to handle fast bowling than others, every single player has a responsibility to have the courage to fight to the bitter end for his team and country. The lower order in this team certainly don't know what "gutsing it out" is about. Someone like Murali would expect his top order to put their bodies on the line to take a catch off his bowling yet he displays a clear lack of commitment to their department.
As far as the bowling goes, how can someone bowl 17 no-balls in a vital Test if he has done his personal preparation well and has left nothing to chance? The team needed him; he was the main striker who was expected to be the man to fight fire with fire-and he buckled. Poor Vaas. He has toiled year in and year out. What he lacks in pace, he makes up with swing and heart and will run in regardless. He is expected to lead the aggression and then catch it from all and sundry when he bats.
Surely the running on the pitch by Pereira is not an overnight problem. How can this all of a sudden just happen? No, someone wasn't watching him properly and it has crept up on them and has bitten them where it hurts most. With two of the front-line bowlers not sleeping well over their problems, the team will start to look around and play for themselves.
The Test series will have an impact on the one-day matches, whether they like it or not. Confidence in your ability to do the job is not like a light switch that can be turned on at will. The captain will feel he has failed again in South Africa if he doesn't get a big one soon. It has a knock-on effect. Sangakkarra and Attapattu look like the only men who will not be affected by the loss. Tillekaratne is never going to win a game for the Sri Lankans by playing the way he does. He can only delay the inevitable.
Should the next Test go the same way, the Sri Lankans will be scarred going into the ODI's and all the preparation that has gone before will be at stake.
World cricket needs a competitive Sri Lankan team outside their own backyard. The challenge that awaits them at Supersport Park in the second Test should not be under-estimated.
© Pat Symcox
