Mahela Jayawardene not interested in full-time international coaching role

Former Sri Lanka captain Mahela Jayawardene has excelled at coaching in a very short time. He has so far been at helm of Mumbai Indians (MI) in their three Indian Premier League (IPL) wins in 2017, 2019 and 2020 and also won the inaugural The Hundred while coaching Southern Brave. No wonder Jayawardene’s coaching credentials have rocketed to the top now.

One shouldn’t be surprised if he is offered a full-time role by an international team especially Sri Lanka in the near future given the state of cricket in country. However, Mahela has cleared that he is not interested in taking up a full-time coaching role at the moment and wants to spend quality time with the family as well.

The 44-year-old reckons a full-time role means he will have to be on the road for most of the time in a year and has no interest in doing that. But he is ready to work as a consultant (for Sri Lanka). At the moment, Mahela Jaywardene is enjoying the challenges of coaching in the leagues and wants to keep it the same way.

“Having done 18 years of international cricket as a player I don’t want to live out of a suitcase for 12 months of the year. This is a good challenge for me and it’s early days. I don’t do too many tournaments so that I have my personal time to spend back home with the family. I’m happy to help out as a consultant here and there (with Sri Lanka) but not on a full-time basis because I would not enjoy that personally,” he said according to Sky Sports.

Mahela likes tweaks to rules in The Hundred

The Hundred was new for everyone and Mahela Jayawardene enjoyed coaching Southern Brave in the tournament. A few rules were tweaked to make it exciting and the former cricketer has certainly liked a few ideas which he believes can be inducted in the T20 format in the future.

“I think you shouldn’t tinker too much, the product itself is pretty good. Personally, I love the new tactical onuses on two overs for a bowler, the new batsman has to come in and face, I think those kind of things might even creep up to T20 cricket, even into World Cups. It’s tactically good for the game, you’re not going away from the rules as such but when a bowler gets a wicket and rather than having the non-striker getting across, you have a new batsman to bowl at,” Mahela further added.