Colombo: Less than 48 hours after Sri Lanka lost their hopes of entering the finals of the Champions Trophy – thanks to India who victoriously won the semi-final encounter, the Sri Lanka Cricket board released a statement announcing their withdrawal from all future international matches with India.
“In lieu of fan fatigue, team fatigue and given our consistently disappointing performance against India, the Working Panel of Sri Lanka Cricket unanimously decided to ensure no matches be organised till at least the Sri Lankan summer of 2018. A notification regarding the same has been sent to the Board of Control for Cricket in India and the International Cricket Council.”
Never in the history of cricket has a national board made such a decision. Having said that, the reasons that the Sri Lanka Cricket board has cited are legit. In recent times, India and Sri Lanka have met for a little too many international encounters. For instance, in the last 34 years (since 1979), of the total 140 one-day international games played between the two countries since the inception of limited-overs cricket, as many as 50 have been played only in the last six years. Statistically speaking, that’s like playing 36% of all cricket in just 18% of the allotted time.
Add to that, with no other opposition country has India or Sri Lanka played this frequently. Since January 1st 2007, while India has played as many as 50 ODIs against Sri Lanka, next in line is England with only 28 matches followed by Australia (26 matches) and West Indies (21 matches). Similarly for Sri Lanka, after India, they have played 28 games against Australia, 25 against Pakistan and 16 against New Zealand. These figures in themselves are shocking.
As far as test cricket is concerned, India and Sri Lanka played their first test in 1982 and have played 35 times ever since. That is 35 games in 31 years ~ 1.12 games per year. 1.12 games a year on an average is pretty standard. From 2007 to 2010 however, they played as many as 9 games taking the yearly average to 3 games per year! In the last three years ever since, the two countries have not played any test cricket. For good, perhaps.
While the above facts strongly support the fan-fatigue that the Indian, Sri Lankan and other cricket fans are going through, India and Sri Lanka cricket encounters have lately brought only disappointment for Sri Lankan cricket supporters. The biggest two disappointments in recent times being the final of the ICC Cricket World Cup 2011 that India won comfortably and the other being yesterday’s semi-final of Champions Trophy.
“I’ll commit suicide if India and Sri Lanka play one more game in 2013. Please RT if you feel likewise…,” joked one cricket fan on Twitter. Interestingly the user who tweeted this had his handle named – @hateindiaslcric. This tweet was retweeted for more than 1000 times in less than six hours of it going live.
Cricket experts likewise had similar opinions to share on India- Sri Lanka cricket. “Aren’t they playing too much cricket? It’s like every other game is India-Sri Lanka these days,” said Rohan Gavaskar on a television talk show. Former cricketer Madan Lal on the eve of the semi-final had claimed India will win decisively, on another TV talk show. He said, “India has a habit of winning against Lanka now. They play too much cricket and know Lankans throughout. We should win this without any issues.”
India captain MS Dhoni had also subtly taunted on the repetitive nature of India Sri Lanka cricket just a day before the semi-final. “Having basic idea of each other (India and Sri Lanka), we can cut down on 10-15 minutes of strategising and meeting,” Dhoni had said.
The announcement has visibly shocked a lot of people, but the fans are apparently happy. @IHateIndSLCric tweeted, “Yay. Looks like SLC board heard my plea. Cricket is going to be so much more joyous now.” While such a move may be welcomed by the public, it will be interesting to see how cricket experts, BCCI and the ICC respond to this announcement.
The rules and guidelines of the ICC do not explicitly mention how such a situation must be handled. However, the tours are only finalised by the involving countries on a mutual basis and if one country does not support playing another, the tournament won’t take place. It is also not known if Sri Lanka cricket will raise any issues for games set with India in multilateral tournaments like the Asia Cup, World T20, Cricket World Cup or the Test Championship that involve all the top test playing nations.
More updates to follow.
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