Rain prevents a decision in St. Anne’s- Maliyadeva Big Match
St. Anne’s were in a winning way when rain in mid-afternoon, followed by bad light later prevented a decision in the Big match between St. Anne’s and Maliyadeva at the Welagedera Stadium.
The man-of-the-match was the Annite skipper Randheera who had five wickets and a belligerent knock of 30 on the first day. Wanitha Wanninayake and Pubudu Ganegama had a good match with bat and ball.
The top score in the match was made by the Maliyadeva captain, Dulaj Ranatunga, who struck an unbeaten 69 in the second innings. Ranatunga, a consistent, heavy scorer had eight fours and two sixes in his first innings.
On the first day, the Annites ran up a fairly tidy total of 236 for 9 before declaring. Their bowlers then proceeded to knock over the Devans for a paltry 86.
Following on, Maliyadeva did much better and thanks to the efforts of Ranatunga, Premadasa and Atapattu, they had cleared the arrears when the rains set in.
St. Anne’s 236 for 9 in 65.4 overs (Dhananjaya Bandara 57, Randheera Ranasinghe 30, Wanitha Wanninayake 31, Oubudu Ganegama 33, Dineth Chandimal 21; Sanjeevan Priyadarshana 3 for45, Nisanjaya
Hettiarachchi 2 for47,Kaveen Maduranga 3 for 60)
Maliyadeva 86 in 25.4 overs (Dulaj Ranatunga 13, Shaluka Atapattu 13, Randheera Ranasinghe 3 for 27,Wanitha Wanninayake 4 for 33, Pubudu Gamage 2 for 12) and 167 for 6 in 51.1 overs (Dulaj Ranatunga 69 n.o, Muditha Premadasa 48, Shaluka Atapattu 26, Randheera Ranasinghe 2 for50, Pubudu Ganegama 2 for 56)