Veteran all-rounder Sanath Jayasuriya has been denied a central contract by the Sri Lankan Cricket Board, while retiring spin wizard Muttiah Muralitharan finds his name in the 20-player list issued for the current year.
Jayasuriya, a veteran of 110 Tests and 444 ODIs, has been in an extended form slump, the extent of which can be gauged by the fact that he averages less than 3 in the last 6 Twenty20 Internationals he has played for Sri Lanka, and has a highest score of just 31 in the last 6 One Day Internationals he has played in.
"We had discussions over the last few weeks with senior players, Sri Lanka Cricket, the selectors and the team management to try and put a value on the national contracts. In that regard we decided we will try and reduce the number of national contracted players to 20 from 30. We felt that having that number of players will give us the cream to be signed up on a contract for the national squad," Sri Lanka's chairman of selectors Aravinda de Silva said.
"The contracts were worked out on the previous year's performances and in Sanath's (Jayasuriya) case, since he had not performed up to expectations, we decided to leave him out. We also allowed him to go to England and play some county cricket to see how he performs. As I've said before we haven't left either Chaminda Vaas or (Muttiah) Muralitharan out of our minds for the World Cup," de Silva added.
However, the 41-year-old prolific left-hander had recently stated that he would like to play next year's World Cup in the sub-continent before finally calling it quits.
The selectors, meanwhile, retained Muralitharan in the contract-list even though the champion spinner had already announced that he will draw the curtains on his five-day career after the first Test against India starting Sunday at Galle.
"Murali had, in fact, mentioned to us that we could leave him out of the contract-list and consider him only for the one-dayers - if we require him - to which I have basically told him from our side that we definitely require him for the World Cup," de Silva said.
The SLC, however, included two newcomers - off-spinner Suraj Randiv and batsman Dinesh Chandimal - in the contract list and have placed the duo in Category Six.
Altogether, there are six categories under which players have been offered contracts. Captain Kumar Sangakkara, Muralitharan, Mahela Jayawardene, Tillakaratne Dilshan and Thilan Samaraweera occupy the top category.
Jayasuriya, a veteran of 110 Tests and 444 ODIs, has been in an extended form slump, the extent of which can be gauged by the fact that he averages less than 3 in the last 6 Twenty20 Internationals he has played for Sri Lanka, and has a highest score of just 31 in the last 6 One Day Internationals he has played in.
"We had discussions over the last few weeks with senior players, Sri Lanka Cricket, the selectors and the team management to try and put a value on the national contracts. In that regard we decided we will try and reduce the number of national contracted players to 20 from 30. We felt that having that number of players will give us the cream to be signed up on a contract for the national squad," Sri Lanka's chairman of selectors Aravinda de Silva said.
"The contracts were worked out on the previous year's performances and in Sanath's (Jayasuriya) case, since he had not performed up to expectations, we decided to leave him out. We also allowed him to go to England and play some county cricket to see how he performs. As I've said before we haven't left either Chaminda Vaas or (Muttiah) Muralitharan out of our minds for the World Cup," de Silva added.
However, the 41-year-old prolific left-hander had recently stated that he would like to play next year's World Cup in the sub-continent before finally calling it quits.
The selectors, meanwhile, retained Muralitharan in the contract-list even though the champion spinner had already announced that he will draw the curtains on his five-day career after the first Test against India starting Sunday at Galle.
"Murali had, in fact, mentioned to us that we could leave him out of the contract-list and consider him only for the one-dayers - if we require him - to which I have basically told him from our side that we definitely require him for the World Cup," de Silva said.
The SLC, however, included two newcomers - off-spinner Suraj Randiv and batsman Dinesh Chandimal - in the contract list and have placed the duo in Category Six.
Altogether, there are six categories under which players have been offered contracts. Captain Kumar Sangakkara, Muralitharan, Mahela Jayawardene, Tillakaratne Dilshan and Thilan Samaraweera occupy the top category.
© CB, Photo courtesy: AFP
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