Thursday Dec 12, 2024
Thursday Dec 12, 2024
Thursday, 20 May 2021 01:44 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}
Professor Arjuna de Silva whose term of office as chairman of SLC Management Committee ended yesterday, and said that his six weeks at the helm was like a T20 match.
“I enjoyed my job, more than teaching medicine to medical students and looking after patients,” was how he described his brief period in running the administrative affairs at Sri Lanka Cricket.
“From the selection side, the selectors have been very bold and innovative. The captains were picked early, and we had enough time to prepare the team for the World Cup or whatever tournament they are going to. From the medical side we have fitness where everyone is on the same plane. Fitness is important and there is medical evidence for that as well when you look at all the teams around the world,” said Prof. De Silva. He said the entire Sri Lanka team has been vaccinated against COVID-19.
Speaking further Prof. De Silva said that Sri Lanka has offered to host matches of the suspended IPL depending on the situation in the country. “We have successfully hosted so many events and shown that our bio-bubble is very good and second to none. We should be the sporting hub in the region, not the Middle East, because cricketing wise we are a strong nation, and we have all the facilities to be a sporting hub especially in cricket.”
On infrastructure Prof. De Silva said that at the Khettarama stadium there is a need for a swimming pool and indoor nets and that he would request the new administration to have a look at that.
“On the legal side Uchitha (Wickremasinghe) has gone through most of the contracts. We have made sure there won’t be a problem like we had with the coach (Chandika Hathurusingha). It has all been gone through and regularised with the SLC lawyer,” said Prof. De Silva.
“Financially the payments process has been made to regularise the payment procedures. We have been speaking with the banks to make it more streamlined and fool proof. Nothing is totally fool proof, but it is a much better system,” he said.
“The 2021 budget has a lot of recommendations to reduce the expenditure. It will be given in a report separately and to improve the disclosure of the system of SLC. For ground maintenance we should allocate more Sri Lankan forces to save money for SLC.” (ST)
