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by Sa'adi Thawfeeq

Sri Lanka's chairman of selectors Ashantha de Mel hit out at the Sri Lanka team management and accused them of being 'selfish' and 'not being national minded' on team selections.

De Mel's criticism comes in the wake of his committee controversially deciding to drop middle order batsman Tillakaratne Dilshan from the upcoming Test series against Pakistan in order to force the team management's hand into including a younger player in the national team.

Dilshan has been replaced by middle-order batsman Jehan Mubarak along with four other players who have been picked in the Test squad to play Pakistan at Faisalabad on October 20 and Karachi on October 28.

"It has come to a stage that the selection committee felt that we have to reduce some of the options in order to get the team management to play them. We send the youngsters saying that we are going to groom them but they are never given a chance to play on the tour. They come back and by the next tour they are left out," said De Mel.

"Our thinking is that we have to start now to include one or two youngsters. We have potential in Jehan Mubarak, Thilina Kandamby and Ian Daniel. It is not that we have dropped Dilshan completely from the side but we feel that there should be some sort of rotation like the Australians are doing to their team. We want to try out one or two players at given times," De Mel continued.

"We sent Kandamby on the Pakistan tour to get some sort of exposure internationally but unfortunately he has not been given a chance to play even against a weak opposition like Zimbabwe."

"If Kandamby for instance was promoted up in the order and given to bat at No. 3 like they did with Dilshan against Zimbabwe we may have got a chance to see what his potential is. He has shown potential at 'A' team level and in the domestic tournaments but we need to find out for ourselves whether he actually has it in him to make it to the top. Whether he is worth investing for the future. The same applies to the other young players as well," he said.

De Mel said that he had in fact spoken to the captain and the coach and told them that as selectors they wanted as much as possible chances given to young players so that they get some sort of experience.

"But it never happens because they are all the time giving the same excuse that they want to win. The only way we can get one of them to play is to take one of them out," he said. "The coach and the captain say that youngsters should be exposed against a team like Bangladesh or against weak opposition. But when it comes to the weak opposition the question comes up of them wanting to win or to improve their averages."

"We had this same thing some years ago when the selectors had agreed with former captain Sanath Jayasuriya to drop Marvan Atapattu for the Kandy Test against Zimbabwe as a rotation policy after winning the first test. Suddenly they complained to the Sports Minister and got Marvan reinstated."

"There is a limit to being selfish. There has to be a situation where Sri Lanka cricket has also got to be thought of. The argument, a lot of them are giving is that you can't give a Test cap for nothing but on the other hand unless you give these youngsters a reasonable chance how are we ever going to know whether they are actually going to make it?" said De Mel, a former Sri Lanka fast bowler who took 59 wickets for his country in 17 Tests.

De Mel recalled the number of chances Atapattu was given despite him getting five ducks in his first six Test innings. "The selectors persisted with him because they knew that he had the talent. It is something like that. You have to invest in the younger players. The only way we can invest is while the experienced players are around.

De Mel said that in the short term he wanted Sri Lanka to win but at the same time he said they also had to build a team for the future. "We feel that there should be players good enough to replace any of the seniors if the need arises at any given time.

In the short term we need to get them to play as long as possible but in the long term we also have to try and groom them while the seniors are still playing. Otherwise, like the West Indies we will go through a huge vacuum," said De Mel.

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