As the blazing sun started to slowly fade away, Sri Lanka’s players returned in groups after having a net at the ICC academy in Dubai. Snehasis Mukherjee, my colleague, and I, had our eyes zoomed in on whether Chamari Athapaththu would be one of them. Around 15-20 minutes went by and there was still no sign of the captain.
After a while, Chamari and Rumesh Ratnayake, Sri Lanka’s coach, made their way out of the academy. It gave an indication that the captain and coach must have had a rather lengthy discussion over their next game against India. The Asia Cup champions began their T20 World Cup campaign on the wrong note, losing to Pakistan. And that was followed by another defeat, this time to the favourites, Australia.
Those two defeats have resulted in Sri Lanka occupying the last slot in the points table. If they hurtle to another loss against India, it would virtually be curtains for the island nation. In that context, the onus is on Chamari to raise her game. Incidentally, the top-order bat has aggregated just nine runs in two matches so far.
Just around a week ago, everything seemed so different for Sri Lanka. Such was Sri Lanka’s brilliant run in the Asia Cup that a few had even tipped them to be a dark horse for the tournament. Chamari herself was oozing confidence at the captains’ meet. “We don’t have any pressure,” she noted. “I don’t want to take too much pressure on my shoulders and my teammates’ shoulders. But we keep it simple. I have a very young team, so we have a few seniors as well. I hope we can continue our best performance, because we’ve been playing really good cricket the last 16 months.”
It is not right to blame just the captain for Sri Lanka’s woes. But there is no doubt that Chamari is the leading light of the side. Even around a decade ago, it was Chamari’s game-changing 43 that turned out to be the foundation stone for Sri Lanka’s victory over India in that T20 World Cup. A couple of years later, she was at it again, with knocks of 38 and 52 against Australia and South Africa in the T20 World Cup held in India. The second of those innings yet again proved to be the cornerstone of a famous Sri Lankan victory.
Even in the recently held Asia Cup final versus India, it was Chamari’s fifty that gave Sri Lanka the belief that they could chase down the target. The list is a long one, and we haven’t even started with her superlative performances in ODI cricket. Such is Chamari’s dominance that the next-highest run-getter for Sri Lanka in T20Is is around 2000 runs behind the left-hand batter.
Those past performances foretell that a game-changing knock is around the corner from Chamari’s willow. The conditions in Dubai could be slightly better for batting when compared to the wickets in Sharjah, where Chamari ended up with a strike-rate of less than 50. If Sri Lanka bat second against India, it could get easier for the willow-wielders, with the dew factor coming into play.
Chamari’s influence goes beyond just the runs she has accumulated. The Sri Lankan captain’s feats have ingrained self-belief in a generation of cricketers – Harshitha Madavi, Kavisha Dilhari and Co. Those girls would be again looking towards Chamari with a twinkle in their eyes, expecting her to lead from the front against India.