Indian tour vital for all players

Sri Lanka will probably finalise their World Cup squad after their tour of India for four one-dayers starting in February.

All players to India must make it their business to perform and catch the eyes of the selectors if they hope to make it to the Caribbean and figure in the ultimate of the instant game, the World Cup, starting in the second week of March.

At the time of writing, the squad to India is hard at practice and if the determined manner in which they are doing their thing is an indication, then the Indians, although playing on their backyard would be tested to the full.

The Indians, too, will be taking the tour of the Sri Lankans very seriously. At the moment they are showing what they are capable of by taking the West Indians the full distance.

The Indians like all teams contesting the World Cup are chopping and changing their team, giving the experienced as well as those vying for places opportunities to prove themselves and nod the selectors.

The selectors too have a part to play and see that the best are selected. They are mindful that they must pick only those who are performing and those who can deliver. Favourites and blue eyed boys have no place.

Winning the World Cup means millions of dollars to the players and the cricket boards and also lucrative sponsorship deals and also to be in big demand, being invited to play in many tournaments.So from now on all teams will be focussed on winning the World Cup and nothing else.

Moody's visit to the Caribbean

During Sri Lanka's tour to New Zealand I had the opportunity of meeting famed TV and radio commentator Tony Crozier and while asking him how the World Cup would go in the Carribean, I asked him particularly how the wickets would play.

The consensus among the Sri Lankans is that the wickets would be spin friendly. But Crozier hit that notion out of the ground by saying that most of the wickets have been relaid,and being new ones, predictions could not be made has to how they will play.

Being a West Indian Crozier knows best and there is no reason why he should not be believed. Then the sending of coach Tom Moody for two weeks to the Caribbean to have a look at the wickets and study them could be of absouletly no purpose.

Just looking at a wicket and saying how it would play, is being untrue to oneself and misleading everyone. How a wicket would play would only be known once the game gets going. Many have been the instances, where wicket readers before the game have been made to eat their own words.

So if the sending of Moody to study the wickets would be beneficial only the end of the tournament would tell.

But sending Moody proves that Sri Lanka Cricket is keen to do everything possible.and leave no stone unturned in their endeavour to pocket the prized World Cup like they did by beating the baggy green capped Australians in the final in Lahore in the 1995/'96 tournament.

What the winning of that final did to Sri Lanka cricket all round needs no reiterating. Not done

It was a cowardly act by the spectator who slapped Indian coach Greg Chappell apparently in frustration that a player from Orissa had not been included in the Indian team.

Apparently that spectator has no knowledge of the game and how a player is selected. Had he been aware, he would not have acted in this disgraceful manner.

That the Indian Cricket Board could not get their security to prevent this attack is a black mark on them and no amount of explaining or apologising to the former Australian captain and batting great could undo the lasting damage done.

That, that spectator was not aware that it is not only Chappell who is involved in selections, but a selection panel, is a sad reflection on the spectator's poor knowledge. Chappell must be smarting. But then being a coach he is aware that these are the brickbats he has to face.