Upul Tharanga, the newly-appointed Chairman of Selectors for Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC), announced Dhananjaya de Silva as the new Sri Lanka Test team captain on Thursday (January 3).
Dhananjaya de Silva takes over from Dimuth Karunaratne as Sri Lanka’s Test captain. Additionally, Kusal Mendis has been named captain in ODIs, while Wanindu Hasaranga will lead the team in T20Is.
Karunaratne captained the Sri Lankan team in 30 Tests, winning 12 games, losing 12 and drawing six games. Under Karunaratne's leadership, Sri Lanka made history by becoming the first Asian side to win a Test series in South Africa in 2019.
SLC and Tharanga’s immediate focus is on addressing issues in the top order and poor fielding that played a key role in Sri Lanka's struggles in the recent ICC World Cup 2023 in India. They finished in ninth place with just two wins in nine matches in the tournament.
The SLC said in a statement: “The new Chairman of Selectors, Upul Tharanga while announcing that Dhananjaya de Silva had been appointed as the new captain of the Sri Lanka Test Cricket Team, and that much as the option would have been for one captain for all three formats that there was no other choice than to go for three separate captains in Kusal Mendis for ODIs.
And Wanindu Hasaranga (for T20Is) because there was no suitable automatic choice, observed that his selection committee's immediate concern was to fix the inconsistency bugging the top order batting as well as poor fielding that had led to the country's recent world cup debacle. However, he said that Hasaranga had been earmarked as a long-term choice.”
Meanwhile, Tharanga stated: “We came apart at the World Cup due to the bugging inconsistency in the batting where mainly the top four who are the nucleus failed to click. If a batsman scored in one game his failure thereafter was a major setback and we aim to arrest that major drawback.”
He signed off by saying, “All these players are not short of talent, but there is an obvious shortcoming where consistency is concerned and we have already spoken with the coaches concerned regarding sorting out this problem. The fielding too was found wanting with a lot of dropped chances where mainly half chances went a begging which at that level of the game have to be taken in keeping with the adage 'catches win matches.”
(With ANI Inputs)
