In the second part of it’s ‘hire everyone as coach‘ policy, the Sri Lanka Cricket Board (SLC) is all set to recruit Malinda Warnapura, Dinuk Hettiarachchi, Dhammika Sudarshana and Sajeewa Weerakoon as High Performance Coaches, Cricket Age exclusively learns.
At the start of this month, SLC had unleashed a plethora of coaches – including Micky Arthur, Shane McDermott, Grant Flower – for the national team, while suspended coach Chandika Hathurusingha still remains a part of system, pending a so called inquiry.
In addition, Lanka De Silva is set to be hired as Under19 fielding coach, while Mahesh Weerasinghe will look after women’s cricket, as development coach.
Warnapura will be hired as batting coach, while Sajeewa Weerakoon and Hettiarachi will be recruited as spin bowling coaches for the national team. The hilarious part is that both are left-arm spinners and now there will be three left armers in national setup, including Sachith Pathirana, who is already working as Under19 spin bowling coach. Even then, for some unknown reasons, SLC opted for these left-arm spinners, while an off-spinner and most successful domestic coach Mathumudalige Pushpkumara was ignored due to some non-cricketing reasons, that eventually forced him to leave the country and join Kuwait national team as head coach. Later, Pushpkumara accused SLC of hiring only political influenced, Top brass favorites as coaches in the national setup!
According to sources, all these coaches will be placed at SLC High Performance Centre (HPC) at Khetterama from January 1, under Chief Cricket Operating Officer Jerome Jayaratne. All these coaches will be paid more than 2.5 lakh per month.
The interesting part is that there are already plenty of High Performance coaches – including
Roy Dias, Sumitra Warnakulasuriya, Dharshana Gamage, Raveendra Pushpakumara, Prasanna Jayawardana, Chamila Gamage, Upul Chandana, Manoj Abeywickrama – at Khetterama.
“It seems that SLC administrators are on the mission to recruit each and everyone in Sri Lanka cricket for HPC. By these rate, soon there will be more coaches than the players in the national setup” an insider at Khetterama told Cricket Age, pointing out that SLC has failed miserably to utilize even these previously hired coaches at HPC.
Also, in newly recruited, only Dhammika Sudarshana gives some hope. Currently head coach of Richmond College, Galle, Dhammika has been hailed as one of the most innovative Coach in domestic system, with unique record at Richmond College.
