“We’ve got a lot of these guys out there whom we are trying to lure back”

Image courtesy of: ESPNcricinfo

Zimbabwe head coach Heath Streak has admitted that the country’s disappointing performance in international cricket over the past couple of years can be attributed to a lack of matches and players choosing to ply their trade elsewhere.

Streak’s comments came just prior to the start of their tour of Sri Lanka, which will consist of five ODIs and a one-off Test match.

“It’s well-documented [that] there have been a lot of players who have left and are playing around the world who come from Zimbabwe,” he said. “It’s been tough for Zimbabwe to retain some of these players and hence we are constantly rebuilding. We’ve got a lot of young guys in our team.

“If you look around the world, and look at Zimbabweans internationally, we’ve got the likes of Gary Ballance, the Curran boys Sam and Tom, who just debuted for England, and Kyle Jarvis playing county cricket successfully.

“We’ve got a lot of these guys out there whom we are trying to lure back. Part of their problem is the volume of cricket that Zimbabwe plays. That’s something that we can’t address, obviously. It’s a Catch 22 situation. We’ve got to play good competitive cricket for other countries to give us matches and that’s something we are really targeting [to do].

“Hopefully we can get some of those players to return to Zimbabwe and complement a talented group of players that we have brought to the shores of Sri Lanka. It’s going to be a challenge because of the lack of cricket. We have these big gaps in between series and that’s probably our biggest challenge to get the guys to get used to playing at [an] elite level.”

Given the situation Zimbabwe currently find themselves in, Streak conceded that it is tough to take in, especially as he represented Zimbabwe at a time when they were consistently competing with the top-ranked sides in the world.

“You inherit the players and your job is to try and get the best out of them. I certainly think that the team we’ve got here has got the ability to win against any side,” he said. “We had some good preparation coming into the series and I am looking forward to a lot of guys who can pull around. The future of Zimbabwe cricket is brighter if we keep doing the right things.”

Zimbabwe’s tour of Sri Lanka, which will be their first since December 2001 to January 2002, will get underway with an ODI in Galle on Friday.