Inter Provincial tourney to be revived

CHRIS DHAMBARAGE

Sri Lanka Cricket have decided to revive the Inter Provincial limited overs and the four day tournaments with the intention of setting up a solid domestic structure for the up coming season.

Secretary SLC Kangadaran Mathivanan said that they have already made arrangements to conduct the Inter Provincial 50 overs tournament from December 29 to January 13, 2008.

The main reason in conducting this tournament is to provide the national players with the ideal preparation ahead of the Triangular limited overs tournament which will be worked off in Australia.

Sri Lanka is expected to tour down under for a series of one day matches against Australia and India from February 5 next year.

A SLC tournament committee spokesman said that skipper Mahela Jayawardena had requested for a highly competitive limited overs tournament ahead of their tour to Australia as they could make use of these matches to fine tune themselves.

Mathivanan said that they are considering playing some of these matches under lights with coloured clothing as the Sri Lanka team will be forced to play a minimum of six matches in Australia under lights.

In addition all other International Cricket Council rules and regulations which came into effect recently will be implemented during the Inter Provincial tournament. The tournament will comprise of five teams and will be conducted on a league basis with the top two teams qualifying to play in the final.

The Western Province will field two teams and they will battle it out along with Central Province, Southern Province and North Central Province.

The probable venues for the matches will be the R. Premadasa Stadium, Sinhalese Sports Club ground, P. Saravanamuttu Stadium, Welagedera Stadium in Kurunegala, Galle International Stadium and the Pallekele Stadium in Kandy.

SLC Secretary Mathivanan said that they would meet shortly to decide on the selection of players for each Provincial team.