Lanka cricket board apologises to Sehwag for no-ball incident

COLOMBO - Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) has apologised to Indian opener Virender Sehwag for denying him a one-day century after a deliberate no-ball from offspinner Suraj Randiv ended the match and left him stranded on 99, despite him hitting the delivery for six in Monday’s one-day match between the two sides.

After the match, Sehwag had criticised Randiv’s actions at a post match press conference, which eventually led to an apology from SLC secretary Nishantha Ranatunga.

“In the morning, Ranatunga called me up personally and apologised on behalf of the board for the Sehwag incident,” India manager Ranjib Biswal said.

“He said this was not in the spirit of the game.

Nishantha said ‘We have a good relationship with India and we apologise for yesterday’s incident’.

“Since the secretary has called us, we are treating this matter as closed,” Biswal said.

Meanwhile Sehwag revealed on Twitter that Randiv had apologised to him personally. “Hi guys. Randiv came to my room n(sic) apologised,” Sehwag wrote.

Ranatunga said the SLC has asked the team manager, Anura Tennekoon, to investigate the incident and will decide whether any further action is needed after seeing his report.

“We have asked him to probe the incident. We will take necessary action in this regard once we get the report. We are upset about the incident and we are unhappy as Sri Lankan cricketers have won the ICC Spirit of the Game award thrice and these things won’t be tolerated,” he said.

According to a cricinfo report, Sehwag was on 99 with India needing one run to win, when Randiv, who had not bowled a no-ball in the Test or ODI series up to that point, overstepped the line by a large margin. Sehwag smacked the ball over long-off but the runs did not count as the no-ball meant India had already won the game.

After the game, a visibly angry Sehwag said Sri Lanka had used such tactics in the past, having left Sachin Tendulkar stranded at 99 with a similar strategy in a match in Cuttack.

“It was clear that the Lankan team did not want me to get to my 100,” Sehwag said. (ANI)