Alison Mitchell meets former Sri Lanka star Kumar Sangakkara ahead of his country’s three-Test tour to England this summer
The applause was loud and long. The audience in the nursery pavilion at Lord’s got to their feet. The 11th MCC Spirit of Cricket Cowdrey Lecture in 2011, delivered by Kumar Sangakkara, was the first to receive a standing ovation since Desmond Tutu in 2008.
Sangakkara was also the first active player to deliver the lecture. He chose to focus on the history of cricket in his country – what he called “the spirit of Sri Lanka’s cricket”.
For 62 minutes he held a room captive with eloquent, moving and deeply insightful words. During that time he laid bare the extent to which politics had become synonymous with the game in his country.
“Board politics would spill over into the team, causing rift, ill feeling and distrust,” he said. “Accountability and transparency in administration and credibility of conduct were lost in a mad power struggle.
“It was, and still is, confusing.”
He called for a better administration, one which “needs to adopt the same values enshrined by the team over the years: integrity, transparency, commitment and discipline”.
Sangakkara, now 38 and back in England playing for Surrey, was less vociferous when discussing the present situation in Sri Lanka for this weekend’s edition of Stumped, which airs on the BBC World Service. When asked if the situation had improved over the last few years, he said: “They’re making a conscious effort, but I think we can still go a long way to ensure that the structures are set up..making sure there is a balanced and settled atmosphere for cricket.”
The structures he talks about are those that link the U19s through to senior international cricket. The word “transition” is likely to be used repeatedly when Sri Lanka tour England this summer, as the country lost the playing services of both Sangakkara and Mahela Jayawardene when the pair retired last year. Sangakkara believes the national team needs to move on quickly, but in order for that to happen in the face of major retirements, he goes back to the domestic set-up.
“Are we putting the right structures in place to ensure that this transition period doesn’t last much longer but gets over the fact that players have retired? Are we actually giving our best cricketers the opportunity to continuously play their best cricket, and the answer is probably no.
“We have some wonderfully talented players, but our structure needs to be fine-tuned at first-class level. We need to ensure there is more quality, there’s better competition and players are continuously tested in skill, temperament, character, mental ability and mental skills so that they can transition from U19 level to first-class, but also first-class to international level with a lot more comfort.
“At the same time you need continuity, where players are not put in and out of sides. If they’re picked to play international cricket they need to be given a good chance.”
Sri Lanka play England in a three-Test series starting next month, followed by five ODIs and a T20I. Sangakkara was a selector for the recent World T20, but he distances himself when asked about an ongoing role. He took on the short-term job at the personal request of chairman of selectors Aravinda de Silva.
“He called me up and said this was a time when I was needed to be of service, and whether I would do this for a short period of time, and I said yes.”
De Silva, who Sangakkara describes as “the best chairman of selectors I’ve worked with”, steps down as at the end of the month to focus on business interests. Sri Lanka Cricket wants to retain his services on an advisory basis and, given Sangakkara’s endorsement, they would be wise to do so, as long as it doesn’t hinder returning chairman Sanath Jayasuriya. For his part, Sangakkara believes he needs to spend longer away from the game and “get rid of this player-only perspective” before getting involved again in an official capacity.
His influence, though, will never be far away. “You don’t have to be an integral part of the administration to be of help. I believe all players past and present should take up the mantle and responsibility of ensuring you give back. Whatever we do around the world we should give something concrete back.”
l South Africa’s reluctance to embrace the proposed pink-ball Test in Adelaide later this year hasn’t come as a surprise. What would surprise me is if money doesn’t talk and the Australia versus South Africa Test eventually goes ahead as a day-night game.
Cricket Australia offered a A$1m sweetener (just over £500,000) to the Australian and New Zealand teams to be the first to play a day/night Test last year. In the aftermath, the Aussie players expressed concerns over the visibility of the ball during twilight hours.
South Africa are yet to play any pink-ball cricket and they believe they will be disadvantaged by playing in alien conditions, which Australia have already experienced.
It is also understood Australia’s players are less than enthusiastic due to the issue of the ball’s visibility. CA’s dilemma is do they table a financial incentive again and, if so, for how long? In 2017 England tour, and if they have not played one before, they, too, will be justified in expressing reservations.
If CA have to incentivise every visiting team until they’ve played at least once, it’s going to be a costly exercise. If the record attendance (for a non-Ashes Test) and bumper TV audiences continue as they did for the inaugural pink-ball Test, though, they may feel it’s worth it.
The other question is, if a financial incentive is offered, should South Africa take it? It doesn’t quite sit right to make the argument on one hand about the importance of a Test series against Australia and the credibility of the contest, yet on the other be swayed by cash.
But, as I said, money talks.
This piece originally featured in The Cricket Paper, Friday April 22 2016
