The belief has grown – Silverwood

By Shehan Daniel

A turn of fortunes on the field has resulted in a renewed sense of belief among his players and trust in the methods put forward by the coaching staff, Sri Lanka’s cricket Head Coach Chris Silverwood believes.

After Sri Lanka lost six of their first eight T20Is at the start of the year, on tours to Australia and India, Silverwood has overseen the team’s bounce back, which culminated in winning the Asia Cup last month, and an unbroken run of five consecutive wins that they will carry into this month’s T20 World Cup.  

“The belief has grown,” Silverwood, who took over as coach in April, said.

“I've been on the opposition side against Sri Lanka a few times, so I knew how the team was trying to play, I knew how we tried to beat them, from an opposition point of view,” Silverwood said, adding that drawing on that expertise has helped develop a working plan for this side.  

“We obviously are trying something different. (But) we saw that starting to manifest in the Australia series, especially the 50 over ones. We saw a different way of playing and I think the success they got there bolstered what I was trying to do and that confidence has kept growing,” he said.

With the players seeing the proof in the results, Silverwood believes the trust between the players and coaching staff is growing.

“They are adapting to new ways of thinking, new ways of doing things and I think because we’ve had some success. The trust is there -- that what we're actually doing is working and we can keep pushing this idea across.”

“So for me, I think we've seen a lot of character growing within the team, we've seen belief grow within the team, and I think there's a method developing which will help us chase and set totals,” Silverwood added.

Silverwood also credited his team’s ability to adjust to the situations in game.  

“The fact is I was told we had no power – (but) five, six, seven and eight can all bash it out of the ground. So, we do have power. What we are doing is put the smarts in there, so the top two are very smart in how they play, they've tried to be very smart in how they build that platform. Somedays in T20 it works, somedays it won’t.”

“And if it doesn't work, like we saw in the final (of the Asia Cup), the people we've got in the middle order are more than capable of actually pulling things back for us, and getting us in front again.”

Along with the team’s adaptability, Silverwood said he was also impressed with the team’s willingness to learn.

“There are quite a few things that have impressed me about the team. Firstly, the willingness to learn, their willingness to adapt and try new things, which is really refreshing. I think we are seeing the results of that. And I think the camaraderie amongst the team. I hear a lot of people talking about how together the guys are and you can really feel that from the inside as well,” he said.

“When I arrived I said there is talent amongst them and I think they are all starting to show that now and show it on the big stage against the big teams as well.”

“A combination of all the three of them together is an exciting prospect,” he added.

Despite Sri Lanka’s positive run of results and Asia Cup triumph, Silverwood believes there are still areas in which his team can improve.

“There's always going to be areas to improve. I think setting totals, something we did really well in the final, but something we haven't done a great deal of. At times we are going to have to think about that,” Silverwood pointed out.

“Equally with the bowling, still working on the yorkers, the various skills we are going to need to make sure we can be successful on the Australian wickets and making sure we have the skills to back the plans up. It’s a constant work in progress, and something we are pushing all the time.”

Captain Dasun Shanaka echoed his coach’s assessment, saying his bowlers needed to master thier variations to succeed in Australia.

“The dimensions in Australia will change from ground to ground -- some grounds the sides are bigger, some grounds it's longer straight on. The bowlers can't depend on one or two variations, they need to have three or four options.”

Fresh from the team’s training camp in Pallekele earlier this week, Shanaka was content with the mood among his team as they depart for Australia today.

“The Asia Cup is one tournament and we are not thinking of that anymore. It's history now, and if think about that, we are not going to do the good things we need to do moving forward, and we’ll lose focus. Even at the camp something we spoke about was that there was a good effort from every player. I thought they would be a little relaxed having won the Asia Cup, but everyone was switched on and were practicing hard. I think that will be reflected in the World Cup as well.”

Sri Lanka’s T20 World Cup campaign will begin on October 16 in Geelong, when they take on Namibia in the first Qualifying Round match, before taking on the Netherlands and UAE for a place in the Super 12 round.