Controversial speech of Lasith Malinga at Water's Edge workshop

Controversial speech of Lasith Malinga at Water's Edge workshop

Lasith Malinga of the Sri Lanka Cricket team who attended a Cricket workshop held at Water's Edge at Battaramulla made a controversial speech about the Cricket crisis that is in sway these days.

"When we ask for a grassy turf, they give us a turf that's like a bald head. When we ask why the grass was cut, they say that the wrong blade has been used in the lawnmower. This didn't happen once ... but twice and

when I told about this to the authorities, nothing happened.

I am not saying that we lost the matches because of that. But when things like this does not happen the way we want ... the self-confidence of the players drop. We have a great big number of coaches. But what we have to ask is whether they are coaches with proper qualifications ... what qualifications they possess to pedal young players towards proficiency. For example, when any player goes through an unsuccessful period the coach should have an ability to help him out. The coach should have the capability to develop his mentality and bring back his skills once again. We have handed over the future of our game of Cricket to a hell of a person who has no experience in first class matches. For such a post we should select a person who is equipped with proper qualifications. But we have given over that responsibility to a person who has played 16 games and has not even scored 100 runs throughout his playing life. This is a serious fault. When a player in the national team goes out of the national team he can't utilise facilities of the team. Though we spoke about this, there's no solution. Because of that we have had to go to our sports clubs for training. Sometime back there was an opinion in some people that a player could be recruited to the national team straight from the school playground. But if that is done, injustice would be done to those who have experience in first class Cricket.

If players like Thilina Kandamby, Chamara Kapugedera, Malinda Warnapura, Gehan Mubarak, Kaushal Lokuaarachchi and Kaushal Weeraratna were properly nurtured ... a thing like this would not happen. All of them possessed first class experience. But all that ... we have lost. What I say once again is not to let such mistakes be repeated. If that happens ... our fate even after several years later would be like this".