Sri Lanka Team Management refute media reports

On late night outs by Lankan cricketers in Kolkata:

Shirajiv SIRIMANE in India

Sri Lanka team management refuted media reports that the team was enjoying late night outs in Kolkata. Media reports in both print and electronic media and a web site carried stories about seven Sri Lankan team members being out of the official hotel until wee hours of the morning, without the knowledge of the management and the Police.

Manager of the side, Brandon Kuruppu speaking to ‘Daily News’ on these reports said that this was totally false and misleading.

“Its true that some members went out but they did take permission from me,” he said. Kuruppu said that the team went out on a ‘free day’ and they returned at ‘reasonable hours’.

He also emphasized that they were escorted by the Police in plain clothes. “Some Policemen were in the vehicles of the team members as well.”

He said that plain clothes policemen were with this team right throughout and there was no breach of security at all.

Meanwhile a seven member committee, comprising Calcutta police commissioner had been appointed by the Cricket Association of Bengal (CAB) president Jagmohan Dalmiya to probe the technical snag of floodlights which halted play for over 20 minutes at Eden Gardens.

“It is a worry. We are yet to identify the problem area but we need to do that very quickly. Since 1993, the ODI matches are being held under lights but only in the last couple of years have we been hit by technical problems,”. Dalmiya, told reporters after the match.

As the lights went off, policemen came down to the boundary line to pre-empt crowd trouble. The spectators waited patiently for about 10 minutes before growing restive.

With four balls of Sri Lanka’s innings left, one of the four floodlight towers went out .Dalmiya said that it was unacceptable that the lights should go out for even five minutes.

For the first time in the history of international matches held at the venue, general spectators were first frisked at the starting point, where gate numbers were indicated as half the stadium closed for renovation, (in preparation for the next world cup.)

The second security check was done at the end of the channelisers.

Media passes were not allowed and fresh accreditation too was needed creating unwanted delays and many asked as to why this match was played at this venue.

The security arrangements were so tight that even someone like the legendary Sunil Gavaskar and former Sri Lanka cricketer Russel Arnold, both doing commentary for the official broadcasters, had to go through the routine security check. Arnold was held back for a few more minutes than Gavaskar, before the production people took him inside.