Sri Lanka News Round-up (23 October 1998)

23 October 1998

Sri Lanka News Round-up

The Daily News

By Ken de Joodt

It was in 1970, that a stylish left-handed batsman, emerged from St. Anthony's College, Kandy, to storm the schoolboy cricket scene! His name was inscribed in the record books of school cricket, by scoring a maiden century at the age of fifteen in the 'big match' - Trinity vs St. Anthony's (1970) - and scoring over ten centuries between 1970 to '73. For his outstanding performances, Merril Dunuwille was awarded the 'Super Eagle'.

After a short holiday in Sri Lanka, Merrill Dunuwille, a brilliant batsman in the seventies, returned to Palmsprings California, where he now resides - to co-ordinate the participation of local Sri Lanka film producers in the Palmsprings International film festival, to be held in the USA later this year.

In a brief meeting with him, Merrill recollected the happy days, when he played for the Sri Lanka Schools XI, along with 'stars' like, Sri Lanka's cricket coach - Roy Dias, Duleep Mendis, Ajith de Silva, Bandula Warnapura and Gajan Pathmanathan, to name a few. He paid a tribute, in glowing terms, for his coach P. W. Perera, a former D. S. Senanayake MV junior cricket coach, (who also coached Aravinda de Silva, acclaimed as the world's best batsman at present!) Merrill later played for Saracens and BRC.

By Beverley Jansz

For the first time in Sri Lanka the Colombo District Women's Cricket Association (CDWCA) has planned to produce women umpires in Sri Lanka. Women umpires are very famous in other countries.

The first seminar for the training of women umpires will be held on Saturday October 24 from 9.00 am to 1.00 p.m. at Nomads Cricket Club, Colombo 7 (opposite St. Bridgets Convent).

The seminar will be conducted by Sri Lanka's experienced and popular Test umpires.

The old boys of Richmond College and Mahinda College will clash for the R.D. Abeygunawardena Trophy on tomorrow at the MCA grounds, Wijerama Mawatha. The game which will be of 25 overs duration will commence at 2 p.m.

The two teams will be captained by Ravindra Lalith de Silva (Richmond) and Upul Sumathipala (Mahinda) who captained their respective schools in 1976. The two Test cricketers Champaka Ramanayake (Richmond) and Jayananda Warnaweera (Mahinda) will also play in this game.

As a first step towards the Bloomfield presidency, former Sri Lanka Cricket Board president Upali Dharmadasa has been appointed a vice-president of the club and given the responsibility of running their cricket.

Club president Shelley Wickramasingha while announcing the appointments, said that he invited Dharmadasa to accept these posts, as he intends retiring in another couple of years - having completed a 25-year term as president of the club - to concentrate on social and religious activities.

In the past ten years, Bloomfield have won every conceivable trophy put out by the Sri Lanka Cricket Board including the Sara trophy twice in the last three seasons. The other season they were runner-up, a proud record under coach Somachandra de Silva, the former Sri Lanka captain and leg-spinner.

Bloomfield continue to be sponsored by Hatton National Bank. Sri Lanka opener Sanath Jayasuriya has been re-appointed captain of their Sara trophy team for the 1998-99 season. - [S.T.]

A fine all round performance by Kasun Edirimanna (76 and 5 for 24) and an unbeaten knock of 52 by Pradeep Roshan helped Sri Palee College Horana beat S.Thomas' Gurutalawa by 99 runs in their inter school cricket tournament match played at Gurutalawa recently.

Sri Palee: 116
(D.Viduranga 23 n.o, P.Roshan 25, Y.Chamilajith 21, N.Dinesh 5 for 42, D.Paran 2 for 29) and 269 for 8 decl (K.Edirimanna 76, A.Cooray 49, P.Roshan 52 n.o, A.Sasika 26, G.Chandrakumara 26 Y.Dantanarayana 4 for 58)

S.Thomas' College: 86
(P.de Silva 23, S.Nisal 21, K.Edirimanna 5 for 24, P.Roshan 4 for 29) and 108 (Y.Dantanarayana 46, P.de Silva 38, P.Roshan 4 for 71, D.Viduranga 3 for 33, V.Caldera 2 for 21)

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