Made in Sri Lanka, adaptable everywhere

Arjuna Ranatunga was the first to tell me about Kumar Sangakkara. We were at the Beach Wadiya restaurant in Colombo. He said there was this boy who had amazing hand-eye coordination and a determination beyond the norm. He added that he was bright and well read, though he could not have predicted that words would become almost as much a Sangakkara currency as runs.

England first saw him in Galle in 2001. Batting at No. 3, he made a fifty and kept wicket skilfully. His movements were almost feline. The match was ill-tempered and Sangakkara was no innocent bystander. You might have called him feisty, arrogant even. The same messages came through during the next game in Kandy, a riveting and controversial Test match that England won to level the series. In the second innings Sangakkara fell five short of a maiden Test hundred, but he had made his mark.

In the final game at the SSC, England overcame the odds to take the series, thanks in part to a magnificent first-innings hundred by Graham Thorpe. On a dry and turning pitch, the battle between Thorpe and Muttiah Muralitharan was the stuff of champions and a tremendous challenge for the 23-year-old stumper, who came through it with colours.

Even then, his interviews were different from the others. He spoke intelligently about match situations and his own contribution to them. He never followed a party line. A decade later he was to give the Cowdrey Lecture at Lord's and delight the audience with his beautiful use of the English language. From it came deep insights into a complex game, withering attacks on administration and impassioned reflections on the history of his nation and the story of its cricket. Arguably, and alongside Bishop Desmond Tutu's animated and thought-provoking recollections and ideals, it was the best of a very good collection of lectures driven by the MCC's Spirit of Cricket initiative. In fact, thinking about this further, you could say that these two men advanced the spirit of the game by taking it out of its own self-centred space and using wider social and political examples to its benefit.

Until you visit Sri Lanka, it is impossible to understand what the cricketers represent. The island is small and has, of course, been divided by civil war. It is a place of highlands and coastlines, of various religions and of tribal discord. Colombo is a wonderful capital city that retains elements of the colonial age without bowing to its instruction. Kandy, the town in which Sangakkara grew up, is distinctively beautiful.

Sri Lankan people smile as a matter of course. The sun shines or the rains come and flood vast areas. The humidity can be thick and overbearing. But still they smile. The soil and fauna are rich. The fields and forests are lush. The tea plantations are dramatic. The food is beyond wonderful, especially at the Beach Wadiya, or was in those days. Nowadays it faces competition from the seafood restaurant owned by Sangakkara and Mahela Jayawardene. In so many ways their destiny has been together.

The island's diversity makes for a fine, resilient people whose warmth and charm know no bounds. Sangakkara is a force of their nature. It may be an exaggeration to say that he bats for a nation but it is right to say that he has carried the hopes of his people with him. They have not been let down.

Suddenly, he is to retire, which means we shall not see him at the wicket again in international cricket. It is a terrible loss for he is an exceptional man. Too many good men are away of late: Daniel Vettori, Michael Clarke, Graeme Smith and the two Sri Lankans, to name a few. In a mad and greedy world there is much dignity in them all.

The Sangakkara statistics beggar belief. Fastest, in terms of innings, to 8000, 9000, 10,000, 11,000 and 12,000 Test match runs. Twelve-thousand three hundred and fifty of them in all, at an average of 57.71. Eleven double-hundreds to Sir Donald Bradman's 12. Fourth on the list of Test hundreds with 38, behind only Sachin Tendulkar, Jacques Kallis and Ricky Ponting. The highest partnership ever - 624 - and against South Africa, so no freebie. You can guess who with. The one-day record is equally imposing. There can be no argument that he is among the greatest batsmen to have played the game. When you consider he spent the first half of his career keeping wicket as well, you marvel.

In this last World Cup in Australia, he batted with a heady mix of the classic and the contemporary and made four consecutive hundreds. He was Raphael and Jackson Pollock on the same page - expressing a physical and spiritual state while remaining abstract and freewheeling as required. The only pity is that it all ended at the quarter-final stage of the tournament.

Paul Farbrace, the former Sri Lanka assistant coach, calls him the most professional cricketer with whom he has worked. This refers mainly to the detail of his preparation and the thought that goes into his performance. It tells us that nothing is left to chance. Sangakkara is not elegant in the way of Jayawardene but he is attractive enough to command attention and near impossible to contain if the mood takes him.

Best, perhaps, is his ability to keep the scoreboard moving without undue risk. In even time you might think Jaywardene is scoring faster but rarely has there been much in it. Jayawardene's strokes leave a great impression, while Sangakkara is more about the bottom line. His best innings have invariably been played when they are most needed and come when others falter. His record abroad is nearly as good as at home, a rare thing among cricketers from the subcontinent.

You might say he is more broker than trader, though not without personality in his batting. It takes courage and a strong mind to maintain the highest standards for 15 years in international cricket. Nothing deters him, least of all angsty bowlers. He has stared each one down and given plenty back from behind the stumps or in the slips. He is no angel for sure but his responses do not come with histrionics or an ugly face.

Probably Jayawardene was the better captain because he had less reference to the practicalities of the game. This is not to say Sangakkara led by numbers but that he relied upon analysis and history more than instinct and hunches. The point is that he is among the first you would take with you to the trenches and reckon to get out alive, having taken a prisoner or two along the way. That's the nub of it; his ruthlessness is well disguised for it comes from within.

One senses he is finally getting the credit he deserves. It is impossible to say he is the best batsman of the age, only that he stands comparison with any of the others. Most of his career has been at first drop, a hard place to spend a life. Yet he has been as likely to make 192 in Hobart against a strong Australian fast attack as to grind out crucial innings with the ball swinging and seaming around English corners. A hundred against the Indians on a turning pitch was as much a masterclass as hundreds in Lahore and Karachi. The South Africans have felt the enormity of his impact every which way. Thus, he is a batsmen for all seasons whose mantra might be the three A's - adapt, adjust, apply.

One hopes he will return to the game in some place other than a commentary box. The Cowdrey Lecture indicated the sort of opinion and independence that should be running the game instead of talking about it. His father was a lawyer, a route he would surely have chosen had cricket not left its calling card. In the way that his talent for the game has been so magnificently justified, it is now the turn of his mind to lead cricket out of the confusion it has created for itself. Either that or prime minister.