Sri Lanka: Antonian great Charlie Joseph dies (30 Aug 1998)

30 August 1998

Antonian cricket great Charlie Joseph dies

By S M Jiffrey Abdeen

CHARLIE JOSEPH, the famous cricketer from St. Anthony's College, Kandy and who was twice the Daily News School boy Cricketer of the year in the early sixties is no more. He passed away peacefully in Sydney Australia last Saturday August 23. He was 55 years at the time of his death.

A technically correct batsman who strode the local cricket scene like a colossus and often reeled off big scores off any school attack. He played for his school team from 1958 to 1961 and every season he had been scoring a minimum of three centuries and managed over 800 runs per season. Those were the days when schools played only their traditional fixtures which numbered around eight matches per season.

After the usual grooming in the junior teams, he played for the first XI in 1958 and soon blossomed into an accomplished batsman, the likes of which the Antonians had never seen since the days of late Jack Anderson.

He could be entertaining even in a crisis when he employed his fine repertoire of strokes to the matter of building up his innings according to his long time coach T. M. Alfred Cooray who chisseled his rough edges to make him a top class batsman. Capable of a peasing array of strokes, remarkable for his technical excellence, and Charlie's greatness lay in his inherent capacity to mould his innings to the requirements of the situation.

Charlie was the second of the famous Joseph brothers of St. Anthony's. The other two being Stephen and Michael. Charlie was a run getting prodigy. One match the Antonians will never forget was the match against Dharmaraja College at Katugastota in 1962. Rajans whose attack was spearheaded by that demon bowler T. B. Kehelgamuwa who routed the Antonians for a paltry 72. The Antonians who were asked to follow on with a big deficit were helped through some aggressive batting by the Joseph brothers - Charlie who scored 120 and his younger brother Michael a belligerent 140 and this pair put on 240 runs for the fifth wicket which rocked the Rajans to such an extent that they were reeling in the second essay.

Charlie's consistent batting saw him being selected as the Daily News Schoolboy Cricketer of the year in 1960 and he repeated this the following year. Thus becoming the only schoolboy to win this prestigious award for two years. Among his team mates were the present Antonian coach H. M. Muthalib, his brothers Stephen and Michael, Michael Raj, C. Pamunuwa, P. Fernandopulle, Bunny Stevens just to name a few. He also played for Combined Colleges.

He would have been an automatic choice to the national team but a planting career took him away to the distant Uva where he played Daily News trophy cricket for Badulla CC till he migrated to Australia some years ago. He leaves behind his wife Deanna and children Samantha and Ananda.

Source :: Daily News (https://www.lanka.net)