Wonder year

A Mahela Jayawardene hundred at the SSC, a Rangana Herath five-for in Galle, a manful overseas record for Kumar Sangakkara, and a double-digit batting collapse: beyond these, there are few certainties in Sri Lankan cricket. Fans have dared not expect much more.

Except that 2014 was different. It was kinda great. There were deflating losses too, particularly towards the back end, but in characteristic Sri Lankan style, please let's forget those for a minute. Let's pour ourselves a fresh coconut toddy, pick at some spicy bites and reminisce about the bloody superb, because, boy, it may not last very long.

Let's begin with Angelo Mathews. At the start of the year he was a pariah, captaining the last day of that Sharjah Test like his brain was on fire, not long before accusing Bangladesh of being boring, when he had been the one to set them 467 to win a Test.

At year's end, he is the deserving captain of virtually everyone's 2014 world Test team, and a double-nominee for the big ICC awards. His batting has been near-supernatural at times, on every continent he has played on, in every match situation. As a leader, he grew so much, so quickly, that he surely had a brain transplant sometime in February. Or had a crayon dislodged from it, Homer Simpson-style.

It doesn't seem like Mathews will ever be the tactical mastermind Jayawardene was, or a visionary general like Arjuna Ranatunga, but as lead-from-the-fronters go, there was none better this year - not even Brendon McCullum, Misbah-ul-Haq or Steven Smith, given Mathews' consistently colossal contributions with bat and ball across all formats. His man management is making strides too: look at how well the younger players bat in partnership with him. A mass exodus of greatness is imminent in the next two years, but with Mathews at the helm there is a calmness about the transition. "Angie will do something" is the hope Sri Lanka fans cling to. At 27, he is already accustomed to this kind of expectation.

Elsewhere, the Jayawardene-Sangakkara farewell tour has been pulling bumper crowds as the pair provides ripping latter-day renditions of their best work. Their last T20 match was the World T20 final win in Bangladesh, which was partly founded on Sangakkara's unbeaten 52.

In August, in Jayawardene's final Test, they put on a century partnership in their last meeting in the middle, pulling Sri Lanka out of a precarious place and setting them on course for a second Test win in a row against Pakistan.

Sangakkara signed off in Kandy with an ODI ton, in another victory, then the most delicious goodbye of all: the final act of the final home match together was a dismissal that read b Jayawardene st Sangakkara. The Premadasa has never been louder, or more enjoyable than at that moment, and that is a ground that sets seriously high standards on both those fronts.

The crowd-pleasing World T20 and Asia Cup wins aside, Sri Lanka were also exemplary in keeping Test cricket alive this year, playing five matches that went undecided into the last ten minutes of play. There was the Sharjah game, then the England Tests, one of which was a nerve-wracking draw, and the other a mind-melting win off the penultimate ball, when a lanky ex-amateur footballer from Chilaw sent a bouncer right at James Anderson's potty mouth and got him fending to a pudgy ex-banker from Kurunegala. There was the desperate search for wickets that never materialised - in the SSC Test against South Africa.

But the best finish of all came in the next series, in Galle. Sri Lanka were chasing 99 in 21 overs, in front of a full house, with hundreds more watching from the fort, when a gargantuan cloud parked itself above the stadium. Mathews began to hook like a madman, lurching Sri Lanka towards victory, before hitting the winning run literally moments before the downpour unleashed. It was like something directed by Michael Bay, only with more fireworks.

Administratively there was of course the annual contracts crisis, the routine player v board public scuffles, internal political jockeying, crippling debt, and allegations of sexual harassment relating to the women's team, but Sri Lanka Cricket has been so resplendently inept in previous years that all board officials will feel entitled to Nobel Prizes for 2014's efforts. Sri Lanka played 12 Tests in the year. Twelve! This was partly due to advancing South Africa's 2015 tour (though, of course, one of the three Tests was transmuted into ODIs), and an impromptu Test visit from Pakistan, who have now been re-embraced as Sri Lankan cricket's bosom buddies, Ahmed Shehzad sermons and all.

Fans complained about the hastily arranged ODI tour of India, on which the team was annihilated there, but as SLC has now lined up India for a return tour in 2015, it is nothing less than a financial triumph. That the board was one of the final two bodies holding out against the Big Three's global domination was more a result of government directive than sparkling integrity, but it was praiseworthy nonetheless. When the board's ongoing support of cricket development in the north is added to all this, officials may even have earned their plump pay cheques and cushy perks this year.

High point
Bats, balls, runs, wickets and elbow-flexions under 15 degrees are all great, but few who were in the heart of Colombo on World T20 victory night will ever experience joy as widespread or as unrestrained. The moment Thisara Perera's stroke crossed the rope, the Galle Face Green broke out in euphoria, and the rest of the city followed. Packed cars rode honking down the street, passengers high-fiving passersby, and trucks carried full cargoes of merrymakers. The dancing stretched all the way to the suburbs, where impromptu baila nightclubs had sprung up around tuk-tuk sound systems.

Low point
That WT20 win was sweeter because Sri Lanka had defeated India in the final, and conversely, nothing hurt fans more than the 0-5 whitewash at India's hands.

Sri Lanka were unprepared for that tour, but were still awful, even given that allowance. Rohit Sharma's 264 was downright traumatic, and the fear now is that India have such a psychological grip over Sri Lanka that a meeting at the World Cup will be stacked in India's favour.

New kid on the block
It has taken some time for him to emerge, but in the last match of the year, Dimuth Karunaratne produced one of the very best hundreds by a young Sri Lanka batsman, on a seaming pitch, against one of the most incisive new-ball attacks around. His talent has always been blinding but his judgement had not been outstanding on previous tours. Perhaps the 152 in Christchurch will bestow the confidence he needs to embed himself in the side.

What 2015 holds
There are gigantic hopes for the World Cup, after Sri Lanka fell at the final hurdle in the two previous tournaments. Beyond that, Pakistan are set to tour again, bless 'em, then the India Test tour, and another incoming tour from West Indies are pencilled in. Sri Lanka may be in New Zealand again, for another Test tour, at the end of 2015.

From a personnel point of view, Jayawardene will have departed from all formats by April, and Sangakkara will probably be gone by October. Herath's enormous heart may still be beating in his coffin a thousand years from now but his knees are growing ever creakier, and it is possible that he will not last much longer than another 12 months as well.