Watching the Sri Lankan bowlers concede 500 plus in the last three Test innings against England made me recall how it used to be in the 1980s and the early 1990s when our bowlers invariably struggled to bowl out the opposition for less than 400 runs. The question that needs to be asked is then whether Sri Lankan bowling has improved over the last 20 years? In my opinion once you take Murali and Vaas out of the present attack it is a definite NO.

This means that various people who have been entrusted with the task of developing Sri Lankan cricket over the last 20 odd years has failed. Whilst our batting and fielding have improved there is no purpose served if we are unable to bowl the opposition out twice in a match. In simple terms this means taking 20 wickets unless our opponents are charitable towards us by declaring their innings. The failure of our bowlers is very disappointing when one considers the fact that the opposition had only one batsman amongst their top six who averaged over 40 runs prior to the commencement of the series.

Vaas a huge disappointment?

It was expected by Sri Lankans as well as our opponents that apart from Murali the biggest challenge for the English batsmen would be from Vaas. He had the perfect attributes to succeed in England - the ability to swing the ball either way and bowl a consistent line and length. He did neither although he did beat the bat more than any other Lankan bowler. There was a comment that he lacked pace. I do agree but I remember watching Kapil Dev, Madan Lal, Roger Binny and Chetan Sharma win a series in England for India in 1986 with swing and seam with no pace. At that time England had Gooch, Gower, Gatting and Botham in their batting lineup!

I have also read enough articles written by former international cricketers from other countries on Chaminda Vaas to know that he is highly regarded as a pace bowler. In fact in a recent Indian TV cricket show the presenter suggested that the 8 wickets taken by Vaas in a one international was a fluke whereupon Javagal Srinath who was a panellist appeared to be offended and stated that it was due to the sheer hard work by Vaas. This I feel was the ultimate compliment to Vaas. There will be many theories as to why Vaas did not succeed in England but ultimately it boils down to the fact that Vaas himself, Whatmore the coach and Foster the bowling coach could not work out a strategy to dismiss a few average Test batsmen.

Nuwan Zoysa, the other pace bowler in the team, was pathetic. His entire body language indicated that he would rather be relaxing under a coconut tree than bowling in England. There was neither any effort nor any passion in his bowling. Eric Upashantha once again showed that he does not have the stomach for the big match due to nerves. His captain did not grant him any favours by asking him to open the bowling. As a Test match bowler I presume you need no favours. Whilst we all were aware that our bowlers were no world beaters I am sure it was not asking too much for them to have maintained a consistent line and length and exert some form of pressure as they did in the first innings of the first Test match.

It was also disappointing to see Murali bowling over after over either over the wicket or round the wicket. It seems that Murali is reluctant to change during the course of an over or even during an entire session. It is difficult to be critical of a bowler who has taken 420 wickets but he should try to emulate Shane Warne in trying out more variations if only to prevent the batsmen from getting used to the same angle of delivery. I have often seen Warne bowling four deliveries over the wicket and then deliver the next two balls round the wicket.

Our batsmen lacked application

Considering that none of the English bowlers were of express pace and that the ball did not swing prodigiously, several of our batsmen got out due to poor strokes which came about due to lack of application and concentration. This was most evident in the second innings of the final Test match when the need of the hour was to save the match. It was disappointing to see Mahela getting out whilst trying to guide the ball through the slip cordon and in the first innings trying to pull a ball which was not short enough . Aravinda in his brief stay showed his class but in spite of all his experience gave his wicket away with the new ball just round the corner. Russel Arnold who at last delivered got out in both innings to very poor strokes. His second innings dismissal when he only had to hang in there for an other hour or so ensured that all the hard work of his went down the drain.

Only Hashan and to some extent Dilhara had the stomach to battle it out although the manner in which Hashan batted in the first innings at Lord’s indicated that the interest of the team was not taken into consideration. I heard a comment as to how Kumar Sangakkara may have developed hernia after stretching so much in an effort to reach the ball when batting in the first innings of the second Test, which started the slide. The stupid run out of Sanath in the first Test match emptomised the approach of our batsmen during the series. All the experience and the averages they had built up counted for nothing when they were truly Tested.

Atapattu - hero or villain?

I presume the record books will show that Marvan came out to bat with an injured finger to try and save Sri Lanka and that this was a courageous effort. I wonder whether we should look at in a different light and say that he should have batted with a broken finger in the first innings to save us from the follow on. The question is whether it mattered to our team as to whether we lost the series 2-0 or 1-0. The manner in which he batted in the second innings for over 30 minutes indicated that he should have gritted his teeth and batted in the first innings as well as batted higher up in the second innings. Sri Lankan cricket desperately needed an act of heroism to have lifted our game.

Recently Anil Kumble came on to bowl with a fractured jaw against doctor’s orders. I remember watching Malcom Marshall bowling with genuine pace after having his left wrist fractured and in the process taking 6 wickets against England in 1984. He also helped one of his colleagues to notch up a century whilst batting one handed. Our own Arjuna Ranatunga batted with a broken thumb to guide Sri Lanka to victory against Pakistan in Pakistan a few years ago. I recall Alan Border batting for over one and half days with a broken finger and scoring a big hundred against England in an attempt to save them from defeat.

Sri Lankan fielding

We had a reputation before this series of being a good fielding side. May be the best in Asia. Alas this too was proved to be incorrect as the entire fielding was below par. The number of times singles were taken which could have been prevented was numerous. The only occasion that I saw some passion in our fielding was when fielders used to throw the ball to the wicket keeper from various angles when the batsmen were not even interested in taking a single. I presume they were checking out the quality of Kumar Sangakkara’s wicket keeping gloves!

No strategy

The most disappointing aspect of our cricket was the lack of strategy in our play whether in batting, bowling or field setting. Compare that with the Englishmen who seemed to have worked out a strategy for each of our batsmen. The manner in which they worked out that Aravinda was no longer happy playing the short-pitched ball was really fascinating. Here was one of the best pullers of the cricket ball struggling to cope with the short ball and how well the opposition took advantage of this! Hats off to Hussain and Fletcher and the English bowlers. Whilst holding the upper hand with a lead of over 280 runs in the first Test we decided to defend but in the subsequent Tests we attacked with no third man which must have cost us over 200 runs.

Whilst in this article I have been critical of our players, it is hoped that a proper assessment will be undertaken by the players and the coach as to why we lost this series and take immediate remedial action. I think most of us have no problem with losing but we need to ensure that we go down fighting every inch of the way. There is no point in the coach saying that this was a learning experience. We have heard this before but it appears that the same mistake is being repeated. The people of this nation look up to our cricketers rather than our politicians to give us all some pride and happiness and it is necessary that our cricketers realise this massive expectation and deliver.