Farveez Maharoof claims that the controversy related to Upul Tharanga has not bothered the Sri Lankan team
Sri Lankan all-rounder, Farveez Maharoof, said that his team is just focusing on the Test series against England at the moment and is not fazed by the off-field happenings, particularly pointing to Upal Thuranga’s controversy of testing positive for illegitimate
substance usage.
Sri Lanka’s limited overs specialist, Upul Tharanga, has been reported positive in a dope test conducted during the ICC Cricket World Cup 2011.
Meanwhile his country is busy playing a Test series in England, facing an uphill battle against one of the world’s best team in the longer version of the game.
The all-rounder said that his team is least bothered about the things happening off-field and the controversy related to Tharanga has failed to distract their concentration and focus on the job at hand.
Maharoof said that the left handed opener is an integral part of Sri Lanka’s One Day International (ODI) team and has served his country quite well in the past five to six years.
He added that Tharanga is a very soft spoken person and one does not expect him to be found in any unreasonable act.
The all-rounder said, “Not, at all. We didn’t speak about it as a team. It hasn’t been a distraction. We are here to do a job and are not bothered about what’s going on outside. He’s a nice guy, a quiet guy. He’s an established opening batsman in our team
and he’s a genuine guy”.
The 26-years-old left hander made his ODI debut in 2005 against http://www.senore.com/Cricket/West-Indies-c760 at Dambulla and since then he has played 121 matches for his country. Tharanga has scored 3898 runs at a reasonable average of 35.76 which includes 11 centuries.
In case the International Cricket Council (ICC) imposes a ban on Tharanga, it will undoubtedly be a huge loss for the Sri Lankan cricket team since the left hander has been doing very well for them in the limited-overs format of the game.
Tharanga has been rated as the replacement for Sri Lanka’s legendary batsman, Sanath Jayasuriya, and his performances in the recently concluded World Cup speak volumes of his abilities to achieve success at the highest stage of the game.
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