Ashley De Silva, CEO of Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC), was Tuesday slammed by the National Selection Committee (NSC) over the high profile withdrawals of Kapila Wijegoonawardene and Roy Dias from the national team selectors race, Cricket Age reliably learns.
Following Asantha De Mel’s forced resignation after 2-0 drubbing against England, SLC had sent five names to NSC for the approval. SLC original list had Pramodaya Wickramasinghe, Kapila Wijegoonawardene, Ramesh Kaluwitharana Waruna Waragoda and Hemantha Wickramarathne
However, SLC suffered first setback, when Kapila Wijegoonawardene withdrew his name, saying he is not interested for the selector post at this particular time. Moreover, Cricket Age learns that the withdrawal letter was sent directly to NSC, instead of SLC.
Then, SLC hurriedly included legendary Roy Dias name as a replacement of Wijegoonawardene.
However, to SLC bad luck, yesterday, Roy Dias also pulled out of the selectors race!
“The members of NSC were pissed off with this ongoing drama. They strictly warned Ashely that the board will have to send a proper list, that too after getting concerned candidate’s consent. It’s some kind of joke, that the candidates, proposed by SLC, are directly sending withdrawal letters to NSC” a reliable source told Cricket Age.
It has been two weeks, since Asantha has resigned. However, till now, there is no update on the new selection committee.
“The NSC members clearly warned Ashley that if cricket board can’t submit names properly, they will have to look for other options” the reliable source added.
Cricket Age further learned that higher authority has clearly instructed that the formal procedure is just a showoff and Pramodaya, who can’t speak proper English even, must be the chief selector, even after being least experienced among all. That’s the reason, first Wijegoonawardene and now Dias pulled out!
“Whether you like or not, the people from Sinhalese Sports Club (SSC) will be dominating in everything in Sri Lanka cricket for next few months or years, until the new Messiah’s continue to occupy decision makers post” the source concluded.
