Asanka Gurusinha, who was part of the 1996 World Cup-winning Sri Lanka team, has been appointed as Nigeria's head coach and high-performance director.<\/p>\r\n\r\n
Gurusinha had an 11-year international career in which he played 41 Tests and 147 ODIs for Sri Lanka. The specialist left-handed batsman is famous for his 65-run knock in the finals against Australia at the 1996 World Cup.<\/p>\r\n\r\n
He subsequently moved to Melbourne and qualified as a level 3 coach. He has worked as cricket manager for Sri Lanka since 2017 and consulted for Cricket Australia as a regional cricket coach.<\/p>\r\n\r\n
The new coach, who has assumed the role from Tuesday, is expected to head the high-performance unit of the Nigeria Cricket Federation (NCF) and also act as a coach trainer and mentor to their indigenous coaches.<\/p>\r\n\r\n
NCF president Prof. Yahaya Adam Ukwenya highlighted the ambitions of Nigerian cricket: "The appointment of Asanka marks another milestone in this administration's desire to raise the standard of the game in the country both at the elite and development level."<\/p>\r\n\r\n
"Internally, his appointment will greatly impact on our development structure as we look to begin our Accelerated Growth Program. On the big stage, Nigeria can no longer take a passing interest in world cricket, we should be able to compete at all levels we play and not just make up the numbers," he added.<\/p>\r\n\r\n
Nigerian cricket has seen significant growth in the last 18 months - highlighted by their appearances at January's ICC U19 Cricket World Cup, as well as in last year's ICC Men's T20 World Cup Qualifier.<\/p>\r\n", "image": "https:\/\/img.cricketnmore.com\/uploads\/2020\/12\/former-sl-wc-winner-asanka-gurusinha-appointed-as-coach-of-nigeria.jpg", "alt_img": "former sl wc winner asanka gurusinha appointed as coach of nigeria", "alt_title": "Asanka Gurusinha", "image1": "", "video": "", "seo_title": "Former SL WC Winner Asanka Gurusinha Appointed As Coach Of Nigeria On Cricketnmore", "seo_desc": "Asanka Gurusinha, who was part of the 1996 World Cup-winning Sri Lanka team, has been appointed as Nigeria's head coach and high-performance director. ", "seo_keywords": "Asanka Gurusinha", "tag": "", "tagging": "Asanka Gurusinha,", "status": "1", "img_rpt": "0", "google": "1", "standout": "0", "edapps": "0", "pulse": "0", "no_index": "0", "feed": "0", "fixture": "0", "slug": "former-sl-wc-winner-asanka-gurusinha-appointed-as-coach-of-nigeria", "user_id": "0", "read_count": "0", "ians_date": "0000-00-00", "ians_time": "00:00:00", "server_time": "0000-00-00 00:00:00", "trash": "0", "view_count": "3781", "page_break": "0", "instant_articles": "1", "auto_link": "1", "created": "2020-12-01 11:34:46", "updated": "2020-12-01 11:35:01", "img_from": "Asanka Gurusinha", "img_source": "", "schedule_publish": "0000-00-00 00:00:00", "news_keywords": "Asanka Gurusinha, Nigeria, Coach, Sri Lanka, World Cup", "livescore_text": "", "livescore_link": "", "btn_text": "", "resend_feed": "0", "google_feed": "0", "read_more": "0", "posted_by": "1", "jio_date": "2020-12-01 11:34:46", "scheduled": "0", "news_now": "1", "breaking_news": "0", "google_date": "2020-12-01 11:34:46", "featured": "0", "pred_match_id": null, "article_content_type": null, "england_cricket": "0", "link": "https:\/\/www.cricketnmore.com\/cricket-news\/former-sl-wc-winner-asanka-gurusinha-appointed-as-coach-of-nigeria-67805" }