Sri Lanka Cricket team has emerged as the newest minnows of world cricket. The only team in world cricket, which plays International matches for gaining positives, Sri Lanka, as expected, surrendered meekly against mighty England as well and lost both the series comprehensively! A 5-0 scoreline proves that Sri Lanka has forgotten the art of winning!
In this hopeless scenario, it should have been the responsibility of Sri Lanka’s million dollars coaches – cricket director Tom Moody, head coach Micky Arthur and batting coach Grant Flower – to step up and guide a struggling bunch of players and bring the team back on the winning track.
However, during the UK tour, some of these highly paid coaches were doing everything, expect for guiding the team!
According to team management insiders, when Sri Lanka were losing match after match in UK, it’s batting coach Grant Flower was fighting with team manager to bring his live in partner with him!
“He (Flower) wanted to bring his partner into the room, saying she lives in Britain and followed Covid regulations” a team management Insider told Cricket Age.
More shockingly, Sri Lanka’s so called cricket director Tom Moody also blindly supported Flower’s demand.
“Even in this COVID and Bio bubble time, Tom moody also supported Flower. Fortunately, the England Cricket Board (ECB) declined this bizarre demand, saying its not safe. Otherwise, it would have been another disaster like Kusal Mendis, Dhanushka Gunathillaka and Niroshan Dickwela incident” team Insider added.
It is noteworthy that Sri Lanka’s horrific batting display in recent times has shocked not only cricket fraternity, but it’s die hard fans also. There were the days, when legends like Sanath Jayasuriya, Aravinda De Silva, Mahela Jayawardene used to score hundreds for the fun. In that golden era, Sri Lanka had broken almost all the batting records of every format. Now, the current generation struggles to put up a decent total 9 times out of 10. There was a time, when Sri Lanka batsmen used to score multiple hundreds in a match. Now, they hardly scores 3-4 hundreds in a year! Obviously, with this pathetic batting display, Flower has been under scanner for not being able to produce any significant results.
Flower, former right hand batsman of Zimbabwe, was hired by Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) on a two year deal in December 2019. He came in a package, along with head coach Micky Arthur.
Right after arrival, his very first words were to Sri Lanka top contender to win last year’s T20 World Cup, which will now be played in October-November this year, due to COVID.
One and half year on, under his watch, Sri Lanka is placed at 10th place in ICC T20 Rankings and it’s batsmen have become a laughing stock for playing kindergarten cricket at international level.
Against England, in T20I series where Sri Lanka were whitewashed 3-0, it’s batsman scored their runs with a strike rate of below 80. It was slow, even for a ODI match in this modern era! In ODI series, they played TEST cricket!
Shockingly, when Cricket Age recently inquired, it learned that Flower draws a whopping 8,000 US$ salary per month, for teaching this horrific batting display to Sri Lanka players!
“As a batting coach, not only he has turned a joke, under his watch Sri Lanka batsmen have also embarrassed country’s batting legacy. He is an utter failure” a Sri Lanka Cricket expert had told Cricket Age.
Over the decades, Sri Lanka Cricket hires overseas white elephants like Flower for reasons best known to Maitland Place’s decision makers! In World Cricket, after India, Sri Lanka has produced the most number of batting greats in recent history! However, their own country picks mediocre foreigner coaches, to oblige them with paid holidays with usually two year contracts!
Their is no dearth of young batting talents in Sri Lanka team. Players like Avishka Fernando, Pathum Nisshanka, Ashen Bandara, Charith Asalanka have the potential to become next generation batting greats! However, an uninspiring Flower have failed miserably in his role to motivate Sri Lanka as a batting unit.
“He is still surviving, only because of a gang of foreigners in Sri Lanka cricket who are applying ‘you scratch my back, I will scratch yours, you protect my job, I will protect yours’ policy” an insider at SLC had told Cricket Age.
As his two years contract will be finishing in December this year, it’s very unlikely that SLC will retain him. He will most certainly fly back to Zimbabwe, the concerned authorities will be searching for another overseas white elephant! In between, it’s also certain that, Sri Lanka will slip further in the Rankings! After all, it has become a most followed process in last two decades!
