When Kusal Mendis stunned us with that spectacular 176 against an attack that had Starc, Hazlewood and Lyon, we had little doubt that we were seeing cricket’s next superstar.
Six years on, with averages of 34, 29 and 20 in Test, ODI and T20 cricket, Mendis has not covered himself in glory. Still, there’s the odd spark. When on song, he hardly puts a foot wrong and is an absolute treat to watch like during the Bangalore Test early this year, but he’s unable to concentrate for long hours and a rush of blood sees him throwing it away. Wanindu Hasaranga has gone onto become the world’s most sought after bowler in T20 cricket and you live in the hope that Mendis would do the same with the bat. But at the age of 27, time is running out.
All hope is that Mendis will turn things around. It’s no secret that he’s not done justice to his immense potential. You wonder how the decision to give him the additional responsibility of wicketkeeper has gone down. Sometimes when you are struggling to make an impact, additional responsibility is not the way forward. We all know what happened when he was entrusted with more responsibility last time around. The vice-captaincy experiment didn’t last long.
Perhaps, Mendis, still the team’s best batsman, is better off just concentrating on his batting. Asanka Gurusinha and Kumar Sangakkara are others from whom wicket keeping duties had been taken off in order that they may concentrate on their batting. They were smart decisions and the team benefited. Those were tough calls as both batters helped to balance the side while keeping wickets. But you needed to make those tough calls.
Mendis has not done a bad job behind the stumps but you need to ask the question whether he’s the best wicketkeeper in the country. Plus, with a World Cup around the corner, we better get our act together now rather than experimenting too much.
Niroshan Dickwella, Mendis’ predecessor gives the selectors a few problems as a batsman in white ball cricket as the only slot he seems comfortable in is opening the batting. So if Dickwella is not your answer, you have got to look out for other options. You don’t drag out your best batsman who is short on confidence and throw him in the deep end, entrusting him the sport’s toughest job.
Sri Lanka squandered an opportunity to square the three match series on Wednesday going down by three wickets. It was a nail-biting finish. When Australia lost their seventh wicket with just 99 runs on the board, there was much hope. But haven’t we seen what an impact player Matthew Wade is during last year’s World Cup. He played smartly as the Aussies won with 13 deliveries to spare.
Some are disappointed that Sri Lanka are not building on the momentum that they developed during last year’s World Cup where they qualified in style and beat defending champions West Indies and Bangladesh before falling narrowly to South Africa.
Since then Sri Lanka have played ten T20 Internationals and won just one. Was the impressive run in the World Cup a flash in the pan? Some may wonder. Well, of those ten T20 Internationals seven have been against world champions Australia and the other three have been versus the world’s number one ranked team India. So the scheduling has been extremely tough and not a true reflection of Sri Lanka’s caliber. On the other hand, playing these quality opponents is a good thing as it will lift their standards. Don’t completely rule out the team making the semis of this year’s World Cup.
This is not to say that Sri Lanka don’t have issues to address. They have plenty of stuff to deal with like their fragile batting and sloppy fielding. Batting has been a real headache with the team at times unable to bat out the quota of 20 overs. These are issues that need to be dealt with and it’s a good sign that some of the team’s young players like Charith Asalanka and Pathum Nissanka are putting up their hands. Seniors are yet to rise up to the challenge and it’s high time that they came on board.
Sri Lanka’s selections also were disappointing. It was pretty clear in the second game that they missed the third spinner. They could have headed to Kandy with everything to play for had they played the extra spinner. Or for that matter, if the batters had shown little more character and pushed the score close to 150. But it’s easier said and done. We have witnessed some fine death over bowling by the Aussies. On Wednesday, in the closing stages, the two Richardsons – Jhye and Kane – hit such good lengths and the batsmen trying to force the score fell like a pack of cards as Sri Lanka lost four wickets for no runs. It’s been painful to watch but they will learn from this experience.
