Out of form, out of favour

End of the road? Dilshan’s stupendous success at top of the order has given Lanka the courage to go without Jayasuriya.

Earlier, watching Sanath Jayasuriya pad up sent shivers down rival teams. On Sunday, the eve of the third one-dayer at the Barabati Stadium, it was surprising to see the veteran, in full gear, heading for the spot where the Sri Lanka reserves were training.

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Jayasuriya’s face showed few signs of emotion, but the resolve to fight out the bad patch was unmistakable.

“It’s always tough to drop a player like Sanath, he is a legend. But at the end of the day, you want to have the best side and that’s the way to go forward. You look at the conditions and combination and it was tough to fit him in the last match. Every player knows how it works, whether it’s Murali (Muttiah Muralitharan), Sanath or anyone else. It’s a question of getting the combination right,” skipper Kumar Sangakkara said at the press conference.

Having changed the concept of batting when then skipper Arjuna Ranatunga promoted him from the middle order to open the innings with wicketkeeper Romesh Kaluwitharana, the 40-year-old now appears to be out of the scheme of things, despite the side losing Angelo Mathews to injury.

Tillakaratne Dilshan’s superb display as opener had opted the think-tank to push Jayasuriya to the middle-order in Rajkot. He was dropped in Nagpur and on Sunday there were few signs that he would play on Monday.

“It doesn’t matter whether it’s a senior or a junior. Whether you take it well or badly, it only goes to show what your real character is.

All our guys accept the fact that you’ve got to perform to stay and sometimes the combinations don’t allow certain players. They are great players and they take it well because we have direct communication when it comes to that,” Sangakkara said.

With 442 one-dayers to his name, Jayasuriya is a match short of becoming the only cricketer to have played at 100 venues, ahead of Rahul Dravid (96) and Sachin Tendulkar (94).