The minister further said the auditor general will be informed after receiving the responses from SLC in order to come to a conclusion within two weeks. “If former coaches Paul Fabrace and Graeme Ford were sacked overnight then who made such a contract between Hathurusingha and Sri Lanka Cricket. I don’t have any issue with anyone including Chandika Hathurusinha and I only requested to re-negotiate the contract,” he said. According to Sports Law, the minister of sports has the right to make a recommendation when it comes to problems in sports bodies.

He said: “Pakistan sacked all the coaching staff and even India was renegotiating their contract with the coach after reaching the semi-finals.

“With Hathurusinha’s coaching only 24 matches were won out of 67 including Tests, ODI and T20 and this shows only a 35% winning rate.

“If anything wrongful is happening in Sri Lanka the people will blame the respective minister and so I don’t need to get a bad name,” minister Fernando said.