A.C.M. Lafir no more
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Former Ceylon cricketer and old Antonian Cricket Legend A.C.M. Lafir is no more. Late Lafir still holds the record for the first wicket with Ronnie Stephens in the Trinity- St Anthony’s big match played in 1954.
Whilst still a schoolboy from St. Anthony’s, he got selected to play for Ceylon against late Sir Leonard Hutton’s team at the Colombo Oval. He was a brave opening batsman who showed scant respect for any bowler including Ted Dexter, when he drove two scorching drives off the back foot through the covers.
Dexter turned around and told him that he has never seen such glorious strokes before. That was the best compliment he ever got. He was batting with late C.I. Gunasekera and he noted that C.I. was reluctant to run for his strokes which were noted by late Ken Barrington.
Abdul Cader Mohamed Lafir was born on 27 October 1935 at Katugastota near Kandy. In 1948, he entered St. Anthony’s College, Kandy, and he captained the First XI in the college’s centenary year in 1954.
Schools cricket
Lafir holds the Sri Lanka record for an opening stand of 266 runs, scoring 176 runs by himself as the school team captain, with Ronnie Stevens scoring 120 runs, in the 1954 annual match against Trinity College, Kandy. He won four awards – best batsman, best bowler, best all-rounder and highest scorer.
Lafir’s school cricket batting average was 108.06, breaking the record of 92.6 set in 1918 by Jack Anderson; scoring five centuries and amassing 1,000 runs in a season. He scored the ‘fastest 100′ in 60 minutes against Ananda College Colombo, in 1954. He led St. Anthony’s in 1954 to become the unbeaten Inter-school Champions and won the Sri Lanka schools Best Batsman Award. He skippered the Kandy schools XI and led them to victory over the Colombo schools XI with a captain’s knock of 151 not out debut in the annual Gopalan Trophy match.
He was the first schoolboy from St. Anthony’s College to play for Ceylon.
against Madras in Madras in 1955–56. Opening the batting, he scored the only century in the match, 107, in a match that Ceylon won by an innings.
In 1960 the Pakistan Eaglets visited Colombo and played a three-day match against the CCA led by C. I. Gunasekera which included Lafir and in the following year he played against India and scored 55. He also toured Malaya and Singapore in 1957.
In 1961 the first consignment of Norm O’Neill cricket bats “Hydromatic Driver” was manufactured in Australia and imported by Dr. Subash Chawla’s Sports firm Chands Ltd. At a special function to launch these new bats, an award to the first batsman to score 500 runs was made to A. C. M. Lafir by the Australian Trade Commissioner in Sri Lanka