Mirpur: Lasith Malinga is contemplating retiring from international cricket after the ICC World T20 which gets underway next month in India. Malinga, who is now leading the Sri Lankan team in the Asia Cup is finding it difficult to manage his knee injury which have been troubling him for quite some time.
At the post-match media conference yesterday, Malinga was asked if he would like to quit after the upcoming edition of World T20, just like Mahela Jayawardene and Kumar Sangakkara did after winning the last edition, he replied: “Might be”.
Malinga elaborated that the state of his knee injury is so bad that complete recuperation might take close to two years, which effectively ends his career as he is nearly 33 years now . “I have played 12 years for the national team. I am now 32 and will soon be 33. I have had a bad injury and if at this stage I have to take one or one and half years of rest, I would rather have to finish my career. If I need to play tough cricket for my country, I dont think I can then totally recover from the injury. Thats why I am saying I dont know how many months or years are left in me. Whatever little I play, I want to serve the national team and my IPL team (Mumbai Indians) well,” Malinga said.
The slinger is ready to play through pain for the national team as the defending champions need him in the big event. “This is not the right time to rest. We have the T20 World Cup and I am the most experienced bowler for Sri Lanka in this format. Whatever painkillers and injections that needs to be used, I will use as this is the end of my career. If I can do something for the team, I will do in these last few months may be. I am still only 60-70 per cent of where I want to be. But I am happy with the result against UAE though,” said Malinga, who led from the front with a four wicket haul in a low-scoring game against UAE in the second match of the ensuing Asia Cup.