Army making huge contributions for Sri Lankan cricket

Rex Clementine in Abu Dhabi

Sri Lanka Army’s ambitious plans to become a force in Sri Lankan cricket have already yielded results and on the other hand, it has benefited Sri Lankan cricket immensely too. Possessing one of the best cricket infrastructures in the country, Army recruited two former Sri Lankan cricket captains Thisara Perera and Dinesh Chandimal offering them officer ranks and hiring many other fringe players as other rankers.

Mystery spinner Maheesh Theekshana is a product of the Army and during the qualifying round of the ICC T-20 World Cup, he has been quite a handful having already picked up six wickets so far, joint highest in the competition along with Bangladesh’s Mustafizur Rahman.

“There are about 150 cricketers in the army. So the competition level is very high. We have our own T20 League and that helped me find a place in the LPL. There’s huge support for cricket. We can train at any time as the facilities are readily available. In the domestic competition, we were in the T-20 finals and reached the semis in the one-day tournament. Army has given tremendous support to uplift the game of cricket,” Theekshana told journalists after his match-winning performance against Ireland on Wednesday.

With Sri Lanka qualified for the World Cup in style, with a game to spare having topped the group, Theekshana said the pressure is now off the team.

“We were under lots of pressure coming into the tournament since we had to play the qualifiers. We were three wickets down with just eight runs on the board and we fought back with Wanindu counterattacking to change the complexion of the game.”

The presence of former captain Mahela Jayawardene as a mentor during the qualifying round of the competition has helped the team lift our morale. What has MJ brought into the side? “There’s a huge difference since he came in. There’s a lot of positive energy within the group. The way he speaks gives a lot of confidence to the players. He doesn’t talk much about the technical things but more about how you should handle situations. He gives clear plans. Even for Pathum Nissanka to score those runs he had to get his mindset right and Mahela’s input has been superb.”

Sri Lanka will play their final qualifying round today in Sharjah. The former champions could try out a different combination with qualifying already done and dusted. Their opponents, the Netherlands, are out of the competition having lost both their encounters.