By Revatha S. Silva
Dasun Shanaka consolidates his leadership?
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Can Dasun Shanaka withhold all unhealthy moves against his leadership coming from the seniors?[/caption]
Amid this reality, will Dasun Shanaka, the newly-appointed Sri Lanka white-ball Skipper survive in the long run?
The news coming from within the Sri Lanka national team is that he has been able to consolidate his leadership within the team. Is the outgoing white-ball Captain, the only leading senior who is in the squad now, giving his fullest support to Shanaka? The team sources say, no. How unfortunate?
We exclusively revealed this week that Shanaka had problems from outside --from his past Skippers-- and on Monday Muralitharan only vindicated what we had revealed. Will the former white-ball Captain fall in line or will he bring inside the team, the ugly outside influences and upset the apple cart?
This is SRI LANKA team, mind you! Not someone’s personal property.
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Muttiah Muralitharan: An unprecedented attack on Sri Lanka’s former Captains and senior players by the world-renowned legend[/caption]
Muttiah Muralitharan, who hardly involves in off-the-field controversies or make adverse comments --unlike his playing days’ adversary, Shane Warne-- was in full flow on a Monday (12) night live television talk-show, aired by Hiru TV.
In a rare and scathing attack, arguably the greatest player in Sri Lanka’s cricket history found fault with current seniors such as Angelo Mathews and Dimuth Karunaratne for instigating division in the national team for their “greed for money”.
“Because the annual contract money for four players have been reduced and others have got an increased amount, these four have got together to end career of the entire 37 players. A small amount has been reduced from four seniors including Mathews and Karunaratne. That is the whole reason for this entire problem,” said the legendary spinner, once going to the extent of naming Mathews and Karunaratne as not world-class players.
“They (the said seniors) have put a lawyer and that lawyer says that the opinion of all 37 players is the same. Are those junior players fools to not sign those contracts in a situation where they have got a pay increase of about 20,000 to 50,000 (US dollars),” he explained.
“What is happening here is, because of the avarice and greed of four or five players, the others have been made to suffer.”
Their perethakama
Explaining the reasons behind the long-standing player contract dispute further, Murali said “Hema ekatama salli. Me thiyenne perethakama.” (They are always concerned about money. This is nothing but greediness.)
Reportedly, the seniors who have undergone a pay cut in the newly-introduced annual contract scheme are Mathews, Karunaratne, Dinesh Chandimal and Suranga Lakmal.
Muralitharan is presently one of the four members of the Cricket Advisory Committee which introduced the much-debated new annual player contracts which the players have argued to have lacked transparency, particularly on certain key areas and the player categorisation system in them.
The Technical Advisory Committee, ratified by both Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) and the Ministry of Sports, is headed by Aravinda de Silva and it also consists Roshan Mahanama and Kumar Sangakkara.
According to reports, both Mathews and Karunaratne are placed in Category ‘A’ --in the Rs. 1.3 million and 900,000 monthly payment tab-- of the proposed annual contracts. Lakmal is placed in Category ‘B’ (Rs. 1 m per month) while Chandimal in Category ‘C’ (Rs. 700,000). Lahiru Thirimanne, another veteran, is placed in the ‘B’ Category for a monthly wage of Rs. 900,000.