New Delhi: The Sri Lankan cricket team has been facing one setback after another since the beginning of year 2022. After 30-year-old Bhanuka Rajapaksa retired from international cricket, Sri Lankan opener Danushka Gunathilaka announced retirement from Test cricket at the age of 30 to focus on limited overs cricket.
Meanwhile, reacting to the sudden retirements or what we can call as the 'retirement culture', Sri Lanka Cricket Board reportedly imposed three new strict rules for its players who intend to retire from international cricket or have already announced retirement.
As per a report in CricTracker.com, three decisions made by the SLC are as follows:
“National players who intend to retire from national cricket should provide three months’ notice to Sri Lanka cricket of their intention to retire.”
“Retired national players who wish to obtain ‘’No Objection Certificates’’ (NOCs) to play in overseas franchise leagues will only be issued to such players who have completed six monSLCths of their effective date of retirement.”
“Retired national players will be considered eligible for local leagues such as the LPL, only if they have played 80% of matches in the Domestic Cricket Competitions conducted in the season prior to the conducting of the league.”
Gunathilaka said he decided to retire after analyzing all the aspects. The Sri Lankan has not played Test cricket since 2018. He has scored 299 runs in eight Tests with the help of two half-centuries in which his top score was 61 runs.
Gunathilaka has a better record in white-ball format. He has scored 568 runs in 30 T20 Internationals at a strike rate of 121.62 apart from scoring 1520 runs in 44 ODIs at an average of 36.19.