Angelo Mathews has been named as Sri Lanka's stand-in captain for the T20I series in the West Indies as Dasun Shanaka, the appointed captain, is yet to join the team because of a delay in obtaining a US transit visa. Mathews has previously led Sri Lanka in 34 Tests, 106 ODIs and 13 T20Is.
As it stands on Sunday, Shanaka is yet to receive the visa, and as such seems likely to miss the entire T20I series - his first assignment as the new T20I captain. He will hope to make the ODI leg of the tour at least, which starts on March 9.
Shanaka did have a proper US transit visa - valid for five years - on a previous passport. But as he had lost that passport two years ago, visa officers told him they must do additional checks, meaning they were not able to greenlight the visa for this tour in time for him to make the flight.
This news is the latest setback for Sri Lanka, who also lost the services of Lahiru Kumara for this tour after testing positive for Covid-19 in the days before departure for the West Indies.
Sri Lanka's multi-format tour of the Caribbean kicks off on March 3, with the T20I series.