Kumar Sangakkara earned a standing ovation for his MCC Spirit of Cricket Cowdrey Lecture two days ago, but the response in his home country has been anything but positive.
While the 33-year-old continued his preparations for today’s NatWest Series match against England, it has emerged that his public criticism of Sri Lanka Cricket in the speech at Lord’s is to be investigated.
The wicketkeeper-batsman used the annual lecture to call for an end to the problems that only last week led to the sacking of the entire SLC board and nomination of a new interim committee within hours. Sangakkara spoke of a “mad power struggle” and lost “accountability and transparency”.
That led to an immediate response from Mahindananda Aluthgamage, the Sri Lanka sports minister, who made it clear that the former captain was acting without the relevant authority.
“He is a contracted player. He has signed an agreement with Sri Lanka Cricket and he can’t make a statement like that,” Aluthgamage said. “He has to get permission. He can’t talk about the cricket administration or cricket.
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“I have written to the chairman of the cricket board to go into this and get me a report immediately.”
The International Cricket Council announced at its annual conference in Hong Kong last week - without naming specific boards - that each administration must ensure democratic constitution and proper governance. The world governing body specified a two-year deadline for that process to be completed multilaterally.
In his speech, Sangakkara had welcomed the directive. “We have to aspire to better administration,” Sangakkara said. “The administration needs to adopt the same values enshrined by the team over the years: integrity, transparency, commitment and discipline.”
Sangakkara, who became the youngest man to deliver the Cowdrey Lecture, quit the captaincy after Sri Lanka lost the World Cup final to India.