Botham's insults fired me - Amal Silva

Amal Silva, the former Sri Lankan wicketkeeper batsman, who scored a century at Lord's in Sri Lanka's first Test match in England, talks about getting sledged by his hero Ian Botham, choosing the school Prince of Wales ahead of St. Sebastian’s and accepting the challenge to do the dual role of keeping wickets and opening batting to Rex Clementine in the Island.

The British press said that Sri Lanka will go home in three days, not five days. Ian Botham said that Sri Lanka were a piece of cake for him. This was after they had lost to West Indies 5-0, mind you. That really motivated us and we wanted to do well. We put up a good show and the English didn’t know where to hide