No domestic cricket for national players | Sunday Observer

No domestic cricket for national players

24 December, 2017

Sri Lanka’s new cricket head coach Chandika Hathurusingha wasted no time after taking over the post officially on Tuesday when he requested Sri Lanka Cricket to refrain from allowing the preliminary squad of 23 players selected for the upcoming one-day tri-series in Bangladesh from playing in the ongoing domestic Premier league tournament.

“The players were asked not to play domestic cricket following a request made by the head coach Chandika Hathurusingha and we have complied with that,” said SLC president Thilanga Sumathipala in a media release yesterday.

The move is aimed at helping the new coach to have quality time with the players, the release added.

The squad holds no surprise except for the re-inclusion of Kusal Mendis who was left out of the Indian tour and the fact that Lahiru Thirimanne, Dhananjaya de Silva and Sachith Pathirana have been excluded.

Training will commence on December 28 and the venue and time would be notified to the players in due course.

Sri Lanka will play a one-day tri-series with Bangladesh and Zimbabwe from January 15-27 in Dhaka before commencing a two-Test series.

THE PRELIMINARY 23 MEMBER ODI SQUAD: Thisara Perera, Upul Tharanga, Danushka Gunathilaka, Kusal Mendis, Dinesh Chandimal, Angelo Mathews, Kusal Perera, Asela Gunaratne, Niroshan Dickwella, Sadeera Samarawickrama, Suranga Lakmal, Nuwan Pradeep, Dasun Shanaka, Lahiru Gamage, Vishwa Fernando, Dushmantha Chameera, Shehan Madushanka, Lahiru Kumara, Akila Dananjaya, Jeffrey Vandersay, Amila Aponso, Lakshan Sadakan and Chaturanga de Silva.

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