Faultering Malinga gets another chance
Dinesh Chandimal and Lahiru Thirimanne will play in Sri Lanka’s must-win third game against India today replacing suspended Upul Tharanga and injured Danushka Gunathilaka to bolster the batting front. The third match will be played in Pallekele before teams head to Colombo for the remaining two ODIs and the one-off T20. Chandimal, the Test skipper, [...]
Shower of sixes at Asgiriya
Old Peterites trounce Old Benedictines It was a sixes all the way as Shehan Fernando (136 n.o in 53 balls, 13×6, 10×4) and Lahiru Milantha bombarded the boundaries to help Old Peterites trounce Old Benedictines in their Under 40 Quadrangular Tournament match at Asgiriya. The Old Bens had their own hero in Madura Madushanka who [...]
Minister draws attention to the sustenance of budding athletes
Sports Minister Dayasiri Jayasekara pointed out that today sports are thriving in the three forces and the police and he affirmed that trend has to be changed. Minister Jayasekera, who was the chief guest at the Third Volleyball National Convention which commenced at the Sri Lanka Foundation Institute made these statements yesterday. “I will be [...]
Athletic Nationals from August 31 to September 2
The 95th National Senior Athletics Championships will be held from August 31 to September 2 at the Mahinda Rajapaksa Sports Complex, Diyagama. The three day event will be conducted by the Athletics Association of Sri Lanka. Over 700 athletes will be involved in it. This meet will serve as a trial for the Commonwealth Games [...]
SL juniors will not take part in AFC qualifying round
The Football Federation of Sri Lanka has decided that the Sri Lanka junior team will not take part in the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) under 16 qualifications round to be held in Saudi Arabia from September 16 to 29. The reason for this is that Sri Lanka suffered defeats at the SAFF Under-15 tournament held [...]
Sri Lanka’s Football coffers risk running dry
The Football Federation of Sri Lanka (FFSL) is currently facing a financial crisis that almost all of its activities have come to a standstill. Sri Lanka’s Football current administration has failed to secure its stronghold financially despite boasting of huge savings through fixed deposits. The Football House may face a difficult time even to maintain [...]
St. Anthony’s, St. Servatius battle for supremacy
The curtains of the Under-17 Division I Cricket Tournament will come down with the final clash for supremacy between two outstation teams St. Anthony’s Katugastota and St. Servatius Matara scheduled to be played on August 30 at Moors SC ground in Braybrooke Place. The specialiaty is that the two teams are playing in the final [...]
Ranaviru Sevana in nail-biting 1-wicket win over Shakthi
Team Ranaviru Sevana scored a nail-biting 1-wicket win over Shakthi to emerge champions at the 6th Dilmah Challenge Trophy National Blind Cricket Tournament 2017 finals played at the Wesley College grounds last Saturday. Both teams comprised of players with varied stages of visual impairment, from partially sighted (B3) to partially blind (B2) to totally blind [...]
Windies Cricket Academy Matale to the fore
The Under (U)-14 Inter-Cricket Academy Limited Overs Cricket tournament organised and conducted by the Windies Cricket Academy Matale with Ranwan Home Appliances (Pvt) Ltd Matale and Supreme Advertising (Pvt) Ltd Matale as joint sponsors, will get under way at S. Thomas’ College grounds Matale on September 9-10 starting at 8 am each day. The 2-day [...]
St. Peter’s ‘B’ emerge Champs
St. Peter’s ‘B’ came out on top against St. Sebastian’s ‘B’ in the final of the Under-17 Division II Cricket final by 4 wickets to emerge champions. During the closely contested final played at Thursdan ground St. Sebastian’s ‘B’ batted first and lost early wickets. Shane Fernando came to their rescue with a well timed [...]
Veterans Table Tennis Assoc. AGM on Sept.12, at 5.30 pm
Annual General Meeting (AGM – 2017) of the Veterans Table Tennis Association of Sri Lanka (VTTASL) will be held on Tuesday, September 12, at 5.30 pm at Otter Aquatic Club, Colombo 7. All members are kindly invited to attend this AGM. Those interested in joining the VTTASL, are also invited to attend this meeting. For [...]
Hockey squad starts training but cancelled later
The Sports Ministry has decided that Sri Lanka will field the Men’s national team for the Asian Hockey Federation (AHF) Challenge Cup to be held Yangon, Myanmar from November 25 to December 3. Seven countries are scheduled to take part in the event. They are Brunei, Chinese Taipei, Hong Kong, Kazakhstan, Sri Lanka, Myanmar and [...]
THE STARK TRUTH
Within the last ten years, Sri Lanka have reached five World Cups, something no other international cricket team—despite having better infrastructure, support systems and environment for players—has achieved. Since then, however, losing has become the norm rather than the exception. This was after the retirement of some of the biggest names in cricket: Mahela Jayawardene, [...]
Does the FFSL Constitution debase the sport!
How do you approach this constitution, not because it has served the sport with much value but more because of how it has been manipulated by continuous administrations over the years to serve narrow ends! The document that circulates freely is open-ended and undated. For what it is worth however, let’s examine some of its [...]
Prabagaran proves why he is known as King of NE
Home town boy K. Prabagaran celebrated yet another golf victoryamidst a ‘happy’ home crowd and the rendering of ‘felicitation fire crackers’ as he comfortably clinched the Sri Lanka Open by seven strokes. He won the prestigious and only ‘Golf Open’ Championship providing the platform to talented Golfers who are non-members of any recognised Golf Club [...]
Loads of spin options but not properly nurtured says Muralitharan
Woung off spinner Akila Dhananjaya may have caused some ripples in the Indian armoury with his haul of six wickets last Thursday, but, no one in his right state of mind would say, that the Lankans do not have a problem in bowling in the present context. Yet, if you wish to delve into the [...]
Two Lankan Surfers for Indian meet
The annual Covelong Point Surf Competition in Kovalam, India, kicks off this weekend with 2 Lankan Surfers– Milan Hennadige and Praneeth Sandaruwan — in the fray. No longer viewed as a whimsical pastime of tourists, the rise in number and skill of local surfers is heartening to behold, as Sri Lanka now competes at international [...]
SLC drowned Rs. 30M on abandoned RPICS swimming pool project
Some critics are of the view that the decline of the Sumathipala administration began right at its inception. Instead of building upon the structures that were laid for the betterment of cricket, the beleaguered administration wasted a colossal sum of Rs. 30,110,689.58 by abandoning the upgrading of the Max Academy Premises at the R. Premadasa [...]
A GEM BUSINESS IN THE OFFING?
The popular house for a sport in the island is said to be bankrupt but for the current year, yet, the profits amount to 101 Million! There is also the talk that the Big Boss of this sport is now planning to give the bottom floor of this building to start a gem business. This [...]
Colombo Masters roll over Old Thomians with 7 wickets to spare
Colombo Masters Cricket Association (CMCA) beat Old Thomians’(OT) by 7 wickets in the inaugural Veterans Cricket encounter played at S. Thomas College, Mt Lavinia. Put into bat, OT openers Vajira Wijegoonewardena (40) and Ramesh Wannakuwatte (16) put on a 50-run partnership. With the departure of the openers wickets fell at regular intervals and OT were [...]
Cricketer Elsie Thattil now shines with the club
Former Colts Women’s Cricket captain Elsie Thattil Pathmanathan, now Moore Park (Sydney) Women’s Team Golf captain, led her team to a historical win in the Division I Pennant at their first attempt. Powerful clubs and perennial winners like Concord, Monash, Killara, New South Wales, The Australian and Pymble were thrust aside as Moore Park continued [...]
Slovenia Men and Hungary Women are Cager Champs
Slovenia’s Men and Hungary’s Women emerged Team champions at the recently concluded International Basketball Federation (FIBA) Under-23 3×3 Basketball (BB) Nations League Tournament 2017, at the General Sir John Kotelawela Defence University Outdoor Courts, Ratmalana, last weekend. Men’s and Women’s BB teams from the Czech Republic, the Netherlands, Hungary, Slovenia, Jordan and Sri Lanka competed [...]
Shafraz and Akhry win KORAC TSD Night Rally
Reigning local rally champions Shafraz Junaid and co-driver Akhry Ameer stamped their supremacy in the first rally outing for 2017, emerging winners of the KORAC TSD Night Rally 2017 concluded in Kandy. The duo won the rally with a clear debit margin. The Time-Speed-Duration (TSD) rally organised by the Kandy Off Road and Adventure Club [...]
US-Open 2017 and Tennis’ Popularity
The dominant players in the last decade are Rafael Nadal, Roger Federer, Novak Djokovic and Stanislas Wawrinka. Between them, they have won 45 of the 50 big events in that period. This year, the top of the ranking has not been stable in the Men’s, and it is most unstable in the Women’s. It is [...]
Men’s ‘C’ & ‘D’ Division finalists found
Unbeaten NDB Bank and Standard Chartered Bank (SCB) advanced to the finals of the Men’s ‘C’ Division with victories over Seylan Bank (Seylan) and HSBC Sri Lanka (HSBC SL), while in the Men’s ‘D’ Division, Lanka Orix Leasing Co. (LOLC) and debutant JAT Holdings (JAT) booked their berths for the finals with wins over HSBC [...]
Taniya Balasuriya is overall winner
Taniya Minel Balasuriya is overall winner of the NDB Private Wealth Junior Masters (PWJM) Challenge Trophy 2017 held at the Royal Colombo Golf Club (RCGC) on August 18. With her unrelenting composure, young Taniya beat out the pack, where top potential young Golfers of Sri Lanka were vying for the crown. Importantly, this year’s NDB [...]
Dialog Champions League Football start on Sept. 2
Country’s premier football tourney–the Dialog Champions League 2017 will be played from September 2, 2017 to December 19, 2017. The tournament which will see 18 teams in two groups competing with will kick-off with the Super Sun SC, Beruwela and Blue Star SC, Kalutara at the Vernon Fernando Stadium in Kalutara. The match is scheduled [...]
Credibility, trust erode when truth is suppressed
Marketing & Service expert Theodore Levitt says, “One of the surest signs of a bad or declining relationship is the absence of complaints from clients. The client is either not being candid or, not being contacted. The absence of candor reflects the decline of trust and deterioration of the relationship.” Words of wisdom for those [...]
High Octane Power-lifters steal the show
Sri Lanka Power-lifting champions Darin Weerasinghe and Ransilu Jayathilake stole the show at the first round of the National Raw Powerlifting Championship held at Bandaragama Youth Centre. Raw power-lifting is sport of pure strength as it does not permit any support gear. Darin was in unfamiliar territory as it was the first time he took [...]
15 Weightlifters for Commonwealth Championships
The Sri Lanka Weightlifting Federation has decided to send a team of 15 weightlifters (men and women) for the Commonwealth Weightlifting Championships to be held from September 3 to 10 in Gold Coast, Australia. Commonwealth medalists Chinthana Geethal Vidanage and Sudesh Pieris will be in the men’s team. The women’s team will consist of six [...]
Nishantha blames ExCo interference for Cricket crisis
Though both siblings Upali and Jayantha Dharmadasa were at the helm of Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC), as the ICC had different thoughts about Interim Committees, the man who really held on to the bunch of keys was its Secretary Nishantha Ranatunga, and only the doors that he wished literally opened. Thus, he kept a tight [...]
What steps should be taken to restore Sri Lanka Cricket?
Many cricket fans are unhappy with our National Cricket Team’s performance. Now that the team has acquired the habit of losing matches one after the other, the players do not know how to overcome this problem. Losing a Test Series 3-0 in your own den is a shame. The same result could be borne if [...]