Arresting the decline

EVER since the Minister of Sport announced last week that he would be calling for elections to the seven sports bodies which are currently under interim administration before the end of March, the local sports circles have been agog with a hive of activity.

None so much as the interim body appointed to administer cricket. Representatives of all seven interim administrations were summoned by the Sports Minister's secretary and asked to present the progress they had made so far and the plans they have for the future.

No indication was given by the Ministry officials to the respective representatives whether they will be asked to continue or disbanded.

Regardless of what the final decision of the Sports Minister will be with regard to the future of cricket's interim body, some meaningful steps need to be taken to address the decline of our national cricket team.

Since November last year, the team has been sliding down the gradient at an alarming pace with no signs of any improvement forthcoming.

Reports filtering in from New Zealand and Australia suggest the sole cause of the poor performances is the disunity that exists within the team. Although the team management has gone to great lengths to paint a rosy picture of how united the team is the truth is far from it.

Player mafia

What we hear about is a player-mafia that is in existence within the team where certain senior players have ganged up together to safeguard their respective positions. Their attitude towards those junior to them has been rather shockingly disrespectful from cricketers of their stature.

The junior players we are told are not given their due place. This is nothing new because this sort of player mafia has been in existent with past Sri Lankan teams also.

What we hear from the grapevine is that players like Michael van Dort and Chamara Kapugedera are cold shouldered and not given the due recognition by the seniors because they refuse to bow down to them and become their baggage boys.

Take the case of Kapugedera, the youngest member of the team. He was picked for the Test tour of India but was sent home even before the series started with a knee injury which according to the team physio's assessment, adequate recovery was unlikely for two weeks.

However within a week after being sent home, Kapugedera was playing for CCC in the Premier tournament and also scoring runs.

In yesterday's VB series match against Australia at Melbourne thereby lies a story the manner in which Van Dort was run out by Jayawardene's call after getting close to a half-century.

There are also unconfirmed reports of certain senior players having late night outs of which the management has no control over.

In the light of all these allegations, some of the interim committee members have flown to Australia to ascertain the actual position.

If Sri Lanka intend getting the players back on track and start performing to their potential as a first step they should seriously reconsider their salary structures which comes up for review at the end of March.

Comfort zone

Presently at least six senior players are sitting quite comfortably perched on salaries of five lakhs of rupees a month which in addition to prize money and other per diem add upto quite a tidy sum.

The manager in his tour report on the recently concluded tour to India stated that 'the current batsmen are too much in the comfort zone due to a lack of ready replacements and I cannot but feel they are too complacent...'

If Sri Lanka Cricket wants the players to perform at their best they will need to restructure the salaries giving them a decent flat rate per month, but paying them fat bonuses for performances and wins.

The salary structure of coach Tom Moody is drawn on a performance incentive scheme where he gets a big bonus for beating ICC ranked teams from 1-5 and a smaller bonus for winning against teams rated from 6-10 on a home and away basis.

Moody also stands to gain a lot more if he can guide Sri Lanka to win the ICC Champions trophy in India in November and the ICC World Cup in the Caribbean next year.

Because the coach spends the majority of his time with the players, one cannot see any reason why the same performance incentives cannot be applied to the players as well. After all it is the combination of these two that make a successful team.

We know for sure the moment Sri Lanka Cricket makes an attempt to revise the salary structure the players are going to be up in arms and try to make a case of it.

But hard decisions have to be taken in the interest of Sri Lanka cricket. The administration has got to be strong to tell the players where to get off. Either they perform and deliver or they don't get paid. It's as simple as that.

The West Indies Cricket Board was firm enough to leave out players in the calibers of Brian Lara, Ramnaresh Sarwan, Chris Gayle, Corey Colleymore to name a few for the tour of Sri Lanka where there was a dispute over team and individual sponsorships.

True the West Indies side was weakened with several 'A'. side players making up the squad, but at least the West Indies Board got the message across to the players that they meant business. The rebel players subsequently returned for the next series in Australia.