Door still open for Malinga, insists Hathurusingha
Sri Lanka’s National Coach Chandika Hathurusingha yesterday reiterated that there was still a place in the National Team for Lasith Malinga, if the fast bowler did his part and met selection criteria.
It has been almost a year since Malinga last represented Sri Lanka in an international encounter – a T20I at home against India last September – and his omission since then has been widely discussed.
Hathurusingha however, said the door was still open and Malinga had the same opportunity that any other player had to be selected, if he played domestic cricket which was the primary criteria.
“He has the same opportunity that any other cricketer has, to get into the team. If he plays in the domestic tournaments, like any other player the selectors will look at him as an option depending on the team’s requirement,” Hathurusingha said.
In May, after the start of the Indian Premier League (IPL), Malinga was named in the Dambulla Squad for the Super Provincial One-Day Tournament, with the selectors demanding that the player must take part in that tournament to be considered for National selection.
But the bowler instead chose to stay in India and honour his commitment with the Mumbai Indians IPL franchise who had drafted Malinga as a Bowling Mentor.
Hathurusingha, meanwhile, was encouraged by the reducing number of injuries to fast bowlers, adding that the nature of injuries in that last four months had not been severe.
“The last six months we’ve seen a tremendous improvement in terms of injuries. We haven’t got any soft tissue injuries in the last four months. That’s a good sign for us, and that is down to training schedules are being managed,” Hathurusingha said, adding that two of Sri Lanka’s premier fast bowlers who had been sidelined with injuries are due to return to action soon.
Dushmantha Chameera is expected to feature right through the upcoming SLC T20 League, while Nuwan Pradeep will be eased into action and will likely play a part at the latter stages of the tournament. Injuries to fast-bowlers will remain a concern leading into the ICC Cricket World Cup next year, Hathurusingha said, but he was also happy with how preparations for the show-piece event were going.
“We know the depth in batting that we have.
The concern with (the fast) bowling is injuries and the selectors and I didn’t have a full squad to select in terms of bowlers because of injuries,” he said.
“The spin department is still evolving and we hope we can look for different combinations.
There are still places up for grab, but overall we know the plan we have and, barring injuries, how we want to play going forward.”
(Source: Daily Mirror)
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Come on Mr. Hathurusinghe. You say the Door is open but we don’t see our great Lion Malinga walking through it. He has few years of cricket left (in T-20). Please use him. We do not need (Pus-Wedilla) boru talks but we need action. We need MALINGA.
why is the door not open to Ajantha Mendis the most discriminated cricketer in the world for the following reasons
By letter dated 9/09/2014 to the then sports Minister Hon Aluthgamage in I stated among other matters Why was Spinner Ajantha Mendis dropped for the finals of Asia cup and Spinner Senanayake retained I stated that Adjantha Mendis who before the finals of the last Asia Cup was the highest wicket taker in Asia cup 2014 with 9 wickets in only 3 matches with a fantastic strike rate of a wicket for every 17 balls left out of the final compared with , Lasith Malinga 6 wicket and spinner Senanayake the selectors 1st Choice spinner with only 4 wickets and a strike rate of 57 three time more than Ajantha Mendis, retained for the finals would not Ajantha Mendis be completely demoralized as in the last 50/50 world cup finals in 2011 he was left out in the finals while having a strike rate very close to Murali and a economic rate the least in the whole world cup of 3.3 to Murali’s 4.11 supporting statistics from crick Info and we lost the cup and there has been no explanation as to the reason he was left out. The then captain Sanga Resigned . I stated that in the 2014 Asia cup omission in the finals also with no logical explanation but most probably would have miss Adjantha Mendis from getting the man of the series as he would have had to obtain only 3 wickets more to retain his fantastic strike rate of 17 this may affect his performance in the next world cup if he is in the squad and in the eleven for the 2015 world cup . I state by a conspiracy of Angelo Mathews the Captain and Sanath Jayasuriya , that among other matters It is the Sri Lanka team that has suffered from the day Ajantha Mendis was thrown out of the squad in November 2014 the very next day he was named the best ODI bowler in the world for year 2014 by the elite ICC panel , this same panel selected him has the only Sri Lankan Cricketer to be in the eleven for the world ODI team for the year 2014. Because of the conspiracy which if investigated by the CID it may involved Indian Bookies He was left out of the ODI squad to New Zealand and left out of the world cup 2015 no reason given by the captain and selectors for such actions and also our so called independent media not a hum even the media may have received payment to be silent