Sri Lanka’s 1996 World Cup-winning captain Arjuna Ranatunga slammed the Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) board for hiring foreign coaches while calling the overseas coaches “garbage” and blamed this for the national team’s current situation in world cricket.

The 57-year-old further said Sri Lanka has their own legends like Aravinda de Silva, Mahela Jayawardene, and Marvan Atapattu as among the best batting coaches in the world, but SLC is always ignoring the local talent and spending huge amounts to “import garbage coaches” for the side.

Sri Lanka won the only World Cup in 1996 and they were the runners-up twice back in 2007 and 2011, losing the trophy to Australia and India respectively and former captain blamed foreign imports for the low ranking of the Sri Lanka team in all three formats of the game.

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Ranatunga said: “We spend huge amounts to import garbage coaches. There is good (coaching) talent in the country, but they are going abroad because there is no recognition for them at home.”

However, he did not name any foreign coaches, but the current Sri Lankan team’s coaching staff is dominated by foreigners with Mickey Arthur heading the side.

Presently, former Australian cricketer Tom Moody is Sri Lanka Cricket’s Director of Cricket, South Africa’s Arthur is head coach of the team while Grant Flower is serving as batting coach and New Zealand’s Shane McDermott is the fielding coach of the side.

However, there are four Sri Lankans in the national coaching staff – Jerome Jayaratne as Team Manager, Kumar Sangakkara as Team Mentor, Muttiah Muralitharan as spin bowling coach, and Chaminda Vaas as a fast-bowling coach with Arjuna Ranatunga serving as SLC President.

(With AFP Inputs)