Sri Lanka national cricketers not paid since World Cup

By Saroj Pathirana BBC Sinhala Service
Sri Lanka players in action during the cricket World Cup Sri Lanka faced high capital costs for its part in hosting the 2011 Cricket World Cup
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Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) has confirmed that the national cricketers have not been paid their salaries for months.

About 100 contracted players are not paid since Sri Lanka co-hosted the World Cup together with India and Bangladesh.

The capital expenditure on the recent World Cup left the country's richest sports body facing a sizeable debt.

There are also doubts whether the SLC would be able to pay salaries in the next two months.

"There is a truth in those media reports to a certain extent," SLC chairman Upali Dharmadasa told BBC Sinhala.

But he said efforts are being made to make the payments as soon as the SLC receives the remaining payments from the International Cricket Council (ICC) for hosting the World Cup.

"The ICC still owes us $4-5m (£2.5- £3.1m)," he added.

Sports Minister Mahindananda Aluthgamage earlier told BBC Sinhala that Sri Lanka still owes more than $18.1m (£11.2m) to the Chinese construction firm that built the brand new stadium in President Mahinda Rajapaksa's hometown, Hambantota.

The minister expressed hope that the issue will be amicably resolved before the end of the year.

SLC's financial troubles come at a time Sri Lanka is competing with Australia to host another mega- sporting event, the Commonwealth Games in 2018.

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