Chandika’s Ban: Punishment Bigger Than Crime

It might be premature yet for Sri Lanka Cricket to contemplate swapping a foreigner for a local to do the job of head coach. At this point in time there’s simply no homegrown coach proficient enough to cope with the sweep of responsibilities, technical and mental, that come with the assignment.
Since 1995, bar a brief stint by Roy Dias in 1999, the national cricketers have always been honed by foreigners, albeit the first, Dav Whatmore, was a Sri Lankan-born Australian. Initially, there was some resistance to recruiting from overseas, fuelled largely by nationalistic sentiments. But then a string of outstanding achievements under the watch of foreigners hushed the dissenting voices. After all, you can’t argue against foreign coaches when three of our last four teams to the World Cup under their charge either won the event (in 1996/ Whatmore), or finished semi-finalist (2003/ also Whatmore) or was finalist (2007/ Tom Moody).
The achievement of the 1999 event, however, was less lofty – a revisit really to the pre-1996 era (or the era of local coaches) when Sri Lanka’s elimination in the league preliminaries was a given. The 1999 team, it has to be remembered, was in the fray as title defenders and their inability to go beyond the preliminary round was a huge disappointment – and cost Ranatunga his captaincy and the local national coach, his job. The difference in the abilities of a foreigner and a local was made obvious. And so, the popular consensus was the national coach’s job was too big for a local; leaving it in the hands of a foreigner, thus, became pretty much board policy.
Successive administrations, however, had spoken of intentions to appoint a local to the job, when the time is right – a promise that smacked more of populist pandering than serious intent. Ranatunga, during his term as Cricket Board Chief in 2008, sounded the most earnest (Rumesh Ratnayake and Roy Dias were bandied as candidates to succeed the departing Moody), but in the end his promise, like his predecessors, was just that: only a promise.
The mindset so was a local is incapable of being national coach. That a majority of other test-playing countries too employed foreigners (presently only Australia and Pakistan employ their own) meant the chances of a Sri Lankan landing the coaching job of his country was, well, as remote as stumbling upon a diamond in your backyard.
So when the board last year co-opted Chandika Hathurusingha into the coaching staff of the national team as ‘shadow coach’, it was forgivable to think that Sri Lanka Cricket had detected a diamond. It wasn’t chance detection, either. Hathurusingha had been coach to the Sri Lanka A team, 2006 through to 2009, during which period he gave the national side all-rounder Angelo Mathews and test opener Tharanga Paranavitana; transformed Thilan Samaraweera from ‘strokeless wonder’ to fluent run-machine and so helped him regain permanency in the test and ODI side; fashioned the return of Upul Tharanga to international cricket after two years in the wilderness and converted Thilina Kandamby from ignored club cricketer to potential 2011 World Cup representative.
These are some of Hathurusingha’s more publicized contributions to the national team. The lesser known ones include the bringing of wicket keeper/batsman Kaushal Silva, present A captain and squad member in the recent test series v. India and quick bowler Suranga Lakmal, to the threshold of international cricket. The duo’s enlistment into the international ranks is imminent.
Impressive as Hathurusingha’s contributions to the national team as A team coach were, inviting him to join the all-foreign coaching team, however, required courage from the decision makers. Apart from the fact that demands of a national team are far greater than that of an A team, there’s also the touchy issue of a local’s capacity to work with foreigners and of course, the danger of political interference via a local coach, as other areas of administration have reportedly been subjected to. Notwithstanding all that, the D. S. de Silva-led administration went ahead and co-opted Hathurusingha into the national coaching set up.
Skipper Sangakkara and his then deputy Muralidaran might’ve recommended Hathurusinga’s appointment, but the final word was no doubt with D. S. de Silva. The present head of SLC was one time a successful coach himself and in 1999, as Sri Lanka’s national junior coach, he produced an outfit that finished number two in the under-19 World Cup. At that time, he never doubted his ability to coach the national team – and told me so. But he was never considered and returned to the UK, hurt and disappointed.
The assumption is irresistible: de Silva was attempting to realise his own unrealised dream (of being national coach) through Hathurusingha. The interim committee chief admitted that in appointing Hathurusingha shadow coach, the plan was to groom him for the job of assistant coach (now held by Stuart Law) and so position him as understudy to Bayliss, the head coach.
That Hathurusingha has held on to his job as shadow coach for over a year obviously means he was on course to the national coach job, which Sri Lanka skipper Sangakkara thinks he is suitable for – more on that a little later.
That being the prospect before Hathurusingha, it comes as something of a shock that the SLC a fortnight ago had asked the shadow coach to stay at home – for two years. This means he’ll be no part of the coaching staff for the 2011 World Cup, six months away. You might think ejecting a shadow coach can do no serious harm to the team – not so skipper Sangakkara. In an appeal to the board for Hathurusingha’s reinstatement, the skipper says:
“I believe that having Chandika in our coaching team considerably enhances our chances in the 2011 World Cup … (and) I firmly believe that after the 2011 World Cup, he has the capability to ably head the coaching of the national team into the future’’, adding, “(his) technical and strategic knowledge was second to none of the foreign coaches I have worked with before.’’
That was a pretty passionate plea. But the skipper might’ve gone on his knees and wept for Hathurusingha’s return, and the reaction would’ve been no different to “you do your job and leave us to do ours’’ – which was what the SLC told Sangakkara anyway, reacting to his pleading.
The SLC’s two-year suspension of Hathurusingha, it has to be said, is not without good reason. The authorities interpret his leaving the team before the final of the recent tri-nation tournament in Zimbabwe as “desertion of duty”. In defence, the shadow coach says approval was obtained from the tour management before returning home – so as to make preparations to attend an Advanced Level Three Coaching course in Australia. The SLC, though, had insisted the shadow coach should return only after the final is over.
Given that leave while on overseas duty requires approval of the SLC, Hathurusingha’s absence from the final in Zimbabwe, defying SLC’s orders, technically is “insubordination”, which the SLC insists is a serious  “crime” deserving of severe punishment. It all sounds like a case worthy of a court martial, of which the air is so filled with these days.
Clearly, the SLC has overreacted, especially when there were valid reasons to view the issue less harshly. For one, it is not as if Hathurusingha’s absence was for some frivolous reason: it was to attend a course in advanced coaching directly benefiting cricket in Sri Lanka. Secondly, the tour management, including the coaching staff and the skipper, had said that his leaving was okay by them; so it’s not a case of defiant truancy that the SLC makes it out to be. Thirdly, missing the two-week course would mean having to stay another year to attend the next course and so delay the benefits Sri Lanka cricket might accrue from the shadow coach’s presence at the course.
If none of the above reasons were good enough for the SLC, then at least the national skipper’s plea for Hathurusingha’s retention ought to have been considered. Instead, it was crassly rejected. In other words – other views, the captain’s included, are not entertained by the SLC, which is dictatorial to say the least.
The upshot: the day a Sri Lankan might be head coach of his country has disappeared into the unknown. And that the one responsible for this sad pass is the one who, in his days of coaching, believed the job was not beyond the natives, is betrayal. Or is it that de Silva thinks no one, before or after him, is fit for the job – only he was.