Colombo: Sri Lanka has knocked the former captain and several former players to replace the head coach of Mickey Arthur who joined Derbyshire Side Derbyshire next month, said the Cricket official said Thursday.
Mahela Jayawardene has been approached for coaches and national team mentors, English daily, the island reported, citing Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) sources which were not named.
The 44-year-old worked on the moral increase in the Sri Lankan team during the latest T20 World Cup but they failed to get to the semi-finals.
Jayawarden told AFP that “no one spoke to me, you must ask for SLC”.
“This proposal is to bind in Jayawardene as one of the maybe a two-year consultant coach with several recent retired players such as Rangana Hatath, Nuwan Kulamanekara and Lasthy Malinga join,” the island said.
A top official told AFP they want to overcome the barriers of language faced by local players when dealing with a foreign coach.
“Maybe there is no direct head coach because the Board considers all options,” said the source, asked not to be named.
“The idea is to get a local coach that can be easily understood by players.” Sri Lanka previously appointed former Sri Lanka Chandika test player Hathurusingha as head coach in December 2017, but he was stopped after the sixth end of the team in the World Cup Odi 2019.
Mickey Arthur will leave after the test series of two Sri Lanka matches against West Indies early next month.
In July, Arthur ordered Sri Lankan players from social media after disatisfied fans launched a campaign to boycott they took part in a series of defeats abroad.
The coach said the players to get “really hammered” on social media and it affected their assessment and mood when they prepared for the T20 World Cup.
In the tournament, Sri Lanka passed the qualification, but lost three of their “Super-12” stage matches to see their semifinal expectations running.
Arthur – who previously trained South Africa, Australia and Pakistan – said he was sad to leave Sri Lanka but the team was in a better place than when he took over two years ago.
“Sad that it was the end of the road with SL after the WI test series!” He wrote on Twitter.