SRI LANKAN CRICKET TEAM SHOULD NOT TRAVEL TO PAKISTAN UNLESS RANIL AND MAITHREE TOO TRAVEL TO LAHORE IN THE SAME FLIGHT, TRAVEL IN THE SAME BUS AND STAY AT THE SAME HOTEL WITH THE SRI LANKAN TEAM.
Posted on October 17th, 2017
By M D P DISSANAYAKE
The final decision of the Sri Lankan Cricket authorities to select an alternative team headed by Kusal Perera to travel to Pakistan to play a T20 match on 29 October, in Lahore is deplorable. It was in a location near Lahore the Sri Lankan cricketers were attacked on 3 March 2009 and since then there had been no concrete evidence of improvement in security in the Region.
At a time when all other cricketing nations are still reluctant to travel to Pakistan, why should Sri Lankan team travel to the same country, in spite of the above incident? This is essentially a political decision by a bunch of ‘yes men’ of the Ranil Maithree government.
They are using sportsmen to achieve their political ambitions. If the government is confident of the security situation, then the President Sirisena and Prime Minister Ranil Wickremasinghe should also travel to Lahore and attend the Gadafi Stadium. Not only the two CEO’s of Sri Lanka should attend the Stadium, we challenge them to travel with the Team in the same Buses and stay at the same Hotels for the duration of the event.