Australia, India cricket series and Asia Cup will go on as scheduled, says Mohan-by Dhammika Ratnweera

Source:Dailynews

Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) is expected to conduct Australia, India cricket series and Asia Cup as scheduled while the discussion between Asian cricket board heads and Australia Cricket chiefs during the recently concluded ICC meeting in Dubai was very successful in holding forthcoming international tournaments said SLC Secretary Mohan de Silva.

After six years Australia cricket team is scheduled to come here for the full cricket series (test, ODI and T-20) Australian cricket officials are very keen to be ready for this tour which consists of two Test matches, three T-20’s and 5 ODI’s while Indians are also expected to tour end of next August and all these series give much-needed income for Sri Lanka.

Meanwhile, Australian officials are already here to look into their tour plan and the security conditions before the Australian series and all these are positives for the forthcoming tours said SLC Secretary Mohan de Silva.

SLC President Shammi Silva had successful discussions with head of the countries cricket boards during the ICC Meeting especially at this hard period we (SLC) are very keen to support the country through cricket series income which is going to be of benefit for the SLC added SLC Secretary Mohan de Silva.

The SLC Secretary further added Asia Cup T-20 cricket tournament will be held from August 27 to September 11th and Asian countries are getting ready for the Asia Cup and it is going to be further strengthened among our Asian countries. SLC officials are in a very positive mood to conduct this Asia Cup with the support of the Asian Cricket Council.

Meanwhile, SLC Secretary said all arrangements are finalised to get the services of new head coach Chris Silverwood from next week (after the new year) and Assistant head coach Naveed Nawaz also will accompany Silverwood for the coaching and their first duty is to focus on the next Bangladesh Test series. SLC expected to make a new setup for the coaching department while apart from the head coach Chris Silverwood, Naveed Nawaz (Assistant Head coach) who also more focused on batting while new fielding coach Former South African first class cricketer Anton Roux and spin specialist coach Piyal Wijethunga give their support to the success of the National team. Australia’s Tim Mccaskill, who is the Head of National Cricket Development at SLC handles all coaches’ responsibilities while consultant cricket coach for the National teams Mahela Jayawardena also gives his fullest support to develop cricket.

“I am very excited to be on board with Sri Lanka and I cannot wait to get over to Colombo and get started,” said head coach Chirs Silverwood. “They have a talented and passionate group of players and I am really looking forward to meeting up with the players and coaching staff very soon,” he added.

Meanwhile, Chairman of the National Selection committee Promodya Wickramasinghe said Sri Lanka is looking to win the Bangladesh test series and that’s very important as part of the ICC Test championship. We have tough series in the future against Australia, India and followed by the Asia Cup and T-20 World Cup and we have to manage our players to focus on all red ball and white ball formats. The Chairman of the selectors is very happy with the players’ performances in the recently concluded National Super League cricket limited over and 4-day cricket tournaments.

We saw talents from our players both seniors and youngsters and we cant’ get all for the National team but we are organising an Emerging cricket team tour to England from the first week of May and that’s an ideal opportunity for the youngsters’ to get more exposure.

Kamindu Mendis the inform batter we are picking for the Emerging team to give more exposure while Prabath Jayasuriya for Sri Lanka ‘A’ side and we have to give them more chances to enter the National team while Charith Asalanka the promising all-rounder who is presently nursing a knee injury should focus on next T-20 world cup said Chairman of Selectors.