Trinity held sway in hill capital cricket
Despite some stumbles and indifferent performances in the last part of the season, Trinity easily outstripped the others by gaining six Victories. Five of them were achieved by lunch on day two. Nalanda, surprisingly, was among the five. Dharmasoka, it must be said, gave the Trinitians a good run for their money.
Skipper Ron Chandragupta was slow off the blocks. But once he got going, the news cascaded from his punishing blade. He had one century, but missed out on two (98 and 80 not out). The other star performer was off spinner Raveen Sayer who had more than a hundred wickets. Sayer was also quite effective with the willow.
Trinity College was the pick among schools from the Hill Capital - File pic
Nushan Weerasinghe, Arjuna Jayasinghe, and Charith Sudarka had some good performances. Under-19 World Cup player Lakshan Jayasinghe missed three fourths of the season. However, when he did return he tended to continue in limited over mode, forgetting the virtues of flight.
The Rajans led by all rounder Deneth Lanka were the only team in Kandy to win the big Match. The skipper made brisk runs and had a biggish haul of wickets with his off breaks. Ramesh Ranasinghe and Chandimal de Silva impressed but tended to be a little inconsistent.
Left arm spinner Venaka Galahitiyawa was outstanding. He captured around 90 wickets and his 7-18 in the Big Match certainly won the match for his team. He had another string to his bios as a late-order left hand sensible batting.
The Antonians failed to win a single match in the tournament. Their cricket seems to have stagnated. They had first innings wins over Ananda, Royal and Trinity (all by single digit margins). The unkindest cut of all come when they suffered relegation. A talented player in all three departments, skipper Nimesha Gunasinghe underperformed. His tendency to try and dominate the bowling led to his downfall quite often. Hard-working Dilan Bandara showed promise and Buvaneka Wijetunga impressed in the last couple of games. The others did not quite measure up.
In common with a few other Kandy schools, the Antonians didn’t have a decent pace attack. They did have a variety of spinners but they were not of match-winning quality.
The Sylvestrians don’t seem to have made much progress, they depended a fair bit on the all round skills of skipper Sumedha Dissanaike. He could have done better. Nimesha Mendis, a prolific wicket-taker the previous year, did not recapture his magic. Sivakumar Tyron gave indications that he will measure up next seasons. Indunil Samarananda, Harsha Madushan and Pabasara Perera did little of note.
First drop bat Hansamal Perera was the outstanding performer, with five fifties and two big hundreds. Tipped to captain next year, he will be a marked man.
Kingswood was over reliant on the efforts of their leading player Tharindu Liyanage. Not attractive but quite effective. That sums up Liyanage’s batting. His off breaks earned him a fair number of wickets.
Skipper Supun Bandara seemed a good, aggressive batsman but his output was way below expectations.
Opener Meedum Weerasinghe was a regular contributor. A left hander with a pleasing style, he has shots all round. Age is on his side, however, and he should be a handful next year.
As for the others – Chameera Bandara, Ravindra Hathurusinghe (the stumper), Prabath Jayawickrema and Lakmal Monarawila – they failed to produce the fifties and the five fours. Chanaka Ratnayake, with around 75 wickets, was Vidyartha’s best performer. Isuru Weerasinghe, their leading all rounder, was consistent but did not provide runs and wickets in bulk. Happily for Vidyartha, both of them will turn out next year as their fifth season.
Opener Krishantha Jayasuriya, the only centurion was quite impressive. Skipper Kasun Navaratne wasn’t all that productive, making only a couple of half centuries. His twin, Dasun, contributed at times with his off breaks and useful batting.
A strange occurrence (or the lack of it) is that, of late, both Dharmaraja and St. Sylvester’s have not been playing Trinity. It would be good if these schools put aside petty thoughts and play each other. After all, there are only four division one schools in Kandy and these constitute three of them. Last nine forget, these will be the only three in 2014/15.