Ranatunga against Murali touring Australia

Adding fuel to the fire surrounding racism in cricket, Arjuna Ranatunga, the former Sri Lankan captain, has advised Muttiah Muralitharan not to tour Australia in November.

The comments by Ranatunga, as reported by Melbourne’s Herald Sun, come in the wake of Australia’s tour of India, a series where racist taunts from the crowd was a topic of discussion.

“I told him I wished he wasn’t touring Australia because of the amount of trouble he has had,” Ranatunga said. “But he wants to go. It was up to him to decide that. My personal opinion was that he shouldn’t go. I think Murali is tough enough to go through that and take whatever he gets.”
Cricket Australia chief executive James Sutherland said he wasn’t surprised with the comments but was confident there would be no issues regarding poor crowd behaviour this summer. CA would launch a new TV advertisement campaign aimed at stamping out poor behaviour in the stands this season, before the first Test against Sri Lanka at the Gabba starting on November 8. Ricky Ponting had already called for fans to show respect to this summer’s visitors, which include Sri Lanka and India.

Murali was subjected to crowd taunts during Sri Lanka’s last visit to Australia and he was said to have been upset three years ago by prime minister John Howard’s suggestion that his action wasn’t clean. Murali, though, said that he hoped to break Warne’s record of 708 Test wickets during the two-Test series in Brisbane and Hobart.