Some Scattered Success here and there during his previous tenure as Bangladesh Head Coach Established a myth that Chandika Hathurusinghe Has the Midas touch and he is a magician who can bring back any team on the track. The debacle in Nidahas trophy however proved that Sri Lanka cricket need him as a Coach, not as a Messiah or Magician.
Right from his first media briefing as the head coach of Sri Lanka in the last week of previous year, Chandika Hathurusinghe has become the most obvious talking point of the Island. Players pushed back at backstage. Hathurasinghe, along with his maverick support staff started to give every single detail to media, started a press chat after every practice session. The talks were everywhere in Sri Lanka that he is doing something especial with team.
Not surprisingly, Thilanga Sumathipala led SLC also happily let Hathurasinghe to capture all the Media attention, so their misdeeds can easily be covered. Their focus was on a mission of loot for the Nidahas trophy and they safeguarded themselves from the media scrutiny as well after the arrival of Hathurasinghe.
He started his tenure with three trophies against Bangladesh, and entire Sri Lanka started to believe that he is indeed a Messiah.
His especial and ultra maverick support staff including Batting Coach Thilan Samaraweera, who strategically joined Sri Lanka before Hathurusinghe to clear his comeback, started to tell media that Hathurasinghe has overnight changed the players. Kusal Mendis again became a run machine and Samaraweera declared that it was only because of Hathurasinghe. Dhananjaya De Silva made classic centuries and Samaraweera declared that it was only because of Hathurasinghe. SLC also repeated this with happiness, as they wanted to establish this myth forever.
So, entering into Nidahas trophy, Hathurasinghe was a Messiah!
The bubble has punctured now! A third string India lifted the trophy, Bangladesh reached into final and SLC earned billions from So called Gala dinner.
The reality is that Hathurusinghe has a long way to go if he really wants to develop Sri Lanka a world class team. He need to identify specific players for each formats. He can’t win t20 tournament like Nidahas trophy by picking test players like Suranga Lakmal, Nuwan Pradeep and Dinesh Chandimal. He can’t afford his colleague selectors to pick players like Jeevan Mendis, purely based on Political reasons. He can’t afford to left players like Lasith Malinga, only because chief selector Graeme Labrooy on a personal vendetta against him.
By only stopping all these loopholes, He can make Sri Lanka a top team. Otherwise, the myth that he is a Messiah of Sri Lanka cricket, will always be remained a Myth!
