Amidst the rubbles of Sri Lanka’s heavy 141-run defeat in Mohali on Wednesday, former captain Angelo Mathews stood tall with his second hundred on the tour.
Sri Lanka desperately need their leading batsman to fire and on this tour, he has come up with some remarkable efforts.
In the second ODI in Mohali, after being set an improbable target of 393, he was fighting a lone battle and remained unbeaten on 111. It was his first ODI hundred in three years.
Mathews had a prolific 2014. It was a remarkable year for Sri Lanka as well with a maiden Test series win in England. The captain made centuries in both Tests at Lord’s and Headingley as Sri Lanka secured a tensed 1-0 series win. Mathews was named Player of the Series.
That year, he scored over 1,300 runs in Tests, the second most in the world, only behind Kumar Sangakkara. His average in 2014 was a stunning 87. His figures were awesome in ODIs as well with an average of 67. His 1,244 runs were just behind Sangakkara (1,256). Since 2014, Sri Lanka have never had world’s two highest run-getters in both forms of the game.
By 2015, he had become the team’s senior-most batsmen and had an equally productive year having scored three Test hundreds.
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Since then, Mathews has lost his golden touch. It has been two tough years for him. His decision to step down as captain in July was a surprising one, but he threw the towel in having steadfastly refused to toe the line with officials who wanted certain selections compromised. Once coach Graham Ford gave in, it was just a matter of time for Mathews to quit.
Sri Lanka were caught off guard when Zimbabwe arrived in the island in June. The tourists had come with a determination that they were going to sweep the spinners. They had quite a bit of success too. Suddenly some wise heads at Sri Lanka Cricket started asking the question as to why our players were not playing the sweep shot.
They failed to realise that players born and brought up on the slow and low turners have better options against spinners rather than the sweep, which in fact is a high-risk shot. Sweeping on rank turners is fine, but buoyed by the license to sweep, Sri Lankan players started sweeping on wickets that hardly offered any assistance for spinners. Mathews too fell into the trap. Then came Tilan Samaraweera.
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The arrival of his former team-mate as the team’s new Batting Coach prior to the Indian series was a godsend and Mathews admitted it after his century in Delhi.
“I should thank Tilan for reminding me a few things that I have been doing right in the past couple of years or so which I have been not doing in recent times. He has been working very hard with us,” he said.
What exactly Samaraweera has been doing with Mathews?
“Angelo is a quality player. His mindset is the biggest thing. Prior to the Test series, I had a long chat with him and tried to tell him to play with a positive mindset. In Dharamsala also he batted well and it seemed to be working. Hopefully, he will go from strength to strength. We have a lot of cricket ahead and Angelo is crucial for us.”
Mathews hasn’t played a single sweep shot this tour. Here’s why? “I spoke about his strengths. His strength is playing straight. Sweep is last option for him,” said Samaraweera.
