Sri Lanka coach Marvan Atapattu resigns after Test defeat against India
Colombo: Former Sri Lankan captain Marvan Atapattu on Thursday resigned from the post of chief coach of the national cricket team following their recent 1-2 Test series defeat against India.
Atapattu's resignation comes after the island nation lost back to back Test series against continental neighbours Pakistan and India in last three months. It has been learnt that Atapattu's resignation has been accepted by the Sri Lanka Cricket's interim chief Sidath Wettimuny.
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Atapattu, one of Sri Lanka's batting mainstay during his playing days, had held the position of chief coach from September 2014 after Paul Farbrace took over as England's assistant coach. He had also worked as a batting coach of the team from 2011 and was also the interim head coach for some time before he was assigned the full charge of the team.
According to reports, SLC is likely to approach former Sri Lanka batsman Chandika Hathurusinghe for the post of chief coach as he has done remarkably well with the Bangladesh national side. Apart from guiding them to the quarterfinal of the ICC Cricket World Cup, the Bangladesh team beat Pakistan, India and South Africa in three successive ODI series. The other name that is doing rounds is of Graham Ford. 44-year-old Atapattu played 90 Test matches and 268 ODIs for Sri Lanka scoring 5502 and 8529 runs respectively.
"Sri Lanka Cricket thanks Mr Atapattu for his efforts as Head Coach and batting coach of the Sri Lanka cricket team, and we wish him every success in all his future endeavours," the SLC statement said.
Sri Lankan team has not been lucky as a string of coaches have come and gone in the last five years. Before Atapattu, the last six coaches between 2010 and 2014 were Trevor Bayliss, Stuart Law, Rumesh Ratnayake, Geoff Marsh, Graham Ford and Farbrace.
