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OWSC Past President's name treasured
By Bernie Wijesekera
Capt. Navin de Silva stood tall for Wesley on and off the field. He is a pride of the century-old Campbell Park school. The OWSC members and young and old honoured him by unveiling his photograph at their annual general meeting held at this club house over the weekend. The Principal of Wesley College, M.A.P. Fernando with the newly elected president, Parakrama Wijemanne, unveiled it.

“Navin, a legend in waiting for Wesley in the year's to come, led by example on and off the field and richly deserves this honour. He has been a pride of Wesley,” said Mr. Fernando. A diehard Wesleyite he was nursed and nurtured by his parents and later by the school. Navin, has not forgotten his humble beginnings, his parents and his teachers who developed his career on and off the field. With his charming ways, he led by example for others to emulate. He possessed all the ingredients to be a leader.

He captained the school cricket team, led the Sri Lanka Under-19 cricket team to England, which included former Lankan captain Arjuna Ranatunga. Presently he is the youngest Sri Lankan Captain in the National Carrier - SriLankan Airlines.
There is a saying "Higher the money climbs - the more you see his tail'. To Navin there was no tail, but always looked at the bottom line. Humility was his code word.

One doesn't always have to wear one's heart on the sleeve. He worked with understanding with his colleagues, but despite a tight official and personal schedule he still had the time to serve his alma mater. During his tenure as president of OWSC, he proved his leadership qualities off the field to work in unison with other members of the OWSC committee for its re-development. He never hung on to office, but made way for others to continue its good work. But he always joined the scrum.
Being a Buddhist he possessed loving kindness and compassion. Knowing, that everything in life is temporary, he believes in religious harmony and racial amity.

Those Champagne moments in cricket
By Hemantha Warnakulasuriya
Richie Benaud one of the cricket's better commentators was commentating for the BBC, when Sri Lanka won the first test match played at the Oval in England. This was one of the most momentous moments for Sri Lankan Cricket. At the end of the day Mr. Benaud chose the most dramatic moment of the day's play and called it The Champaign Moment of the day.

I was inquisitive to know what the Champagne moment of the day was at the time our team recorded this momentous victory. Before the telecasting of the event Richie Benaud said what you are going to see is not only the champagne moment of the day but the champagne moment of the match and the one of the finest moments of cricket I have witnessed for a long time.

The English Test team was craftily manipulating a method to prevent Sri Lanka from scoring the few runs needed to record the historical win. It was a gloomy day and the sun was overcast and weatherman predicted a heavy downpour.

England Captain Mike Atherton looked to the heavens and virtually prayed for the skies to open. The bowlers were instructed to bowl wide of the wicket. The opening pair was struggling to connect the bat with the ball. After some effort they managed to come within 5 runs to victory.

The light was very dull and the sky was about open abandoning any prospect of continuing the game. There were only few minutes between victory and a draw. The bowler was steaming and the ball flew past the off stump far away from the bat but not far away to be called a wide. The next ball was bowled and in a flash Sanath moved towards the off stump and it was a bouncer.

He virtually leapt and smacked it over point. Like a thunderbolt it flew over the point boundary. Richie Benaud showed this in slow motion virtually advancing the motion frame by frame and one saw an amzing spectacle. Sanath was virtually floating in the air when he touched the ball with awesome power. Though I have been watching cricket I never saw such sweet memorable moment until I saw two such episodes on television in one day. First episode was at Dambulla.

It was when young Tuan Dilshan an immensely talented cricketer who comes from a poor family has been chopped from the side due to minor loss of form and never given another chance to show his immense talent. He was brought into the side with some remorse as the blue eyed boys were failing miserably.

The so called middle order comprises the blue eyed boys who have lost their talents due to various reasons other than cricket. Knowing very well that their connections with the establishment would not permit them to be dropped however much they fail.
The spectators who are very knowledgeable treated one of them with national jeer and with utter disdain when the boy failed and ran out two others.

The national anti anthem of the spectators at Dambulla was not directed towards the player but towards the selectors and the establishment. On a wicket where the mighty and heavily built New Zealanders struggled and ball was not moving the outfield was so slow the ball stopped as if it was glued to the turf. When the sad spectacle of defeat was looming large and as the thunderstorms were tearing the skies in Colombo, Tuan Dilshan came in timed the ball from the sweetest spot in his bat the ball sped to the boundary as if it had young and strong legs.

Tuffy was one of the best bowlers in contemporary cricket. Three successive fours were hit by Dilshan sealed the fate of the New Zealanders. The present chicken heartedness of our cricketers was clearly shown in this match as we gave up chasing the bonus point.

The next champagne moment happened in the West Indies recently. The selectors have taken a bold decision to infuse young blood to the West Indies side. The first three matches Caribbean's lost very badly. After that match Lara said very soon the young West Indian side will come back to reckoning and would soon be on the forefront in cricket.

The very next match the West Indies defeated the world champions by establishing a world record for having scored the most number of runs in the fourth innings. Here again young batsman like Sarwan and veteran Chanderpaul scored centuries. But when Chanderpaul added only one run and got out it on the fifth day morning leaving the bowlers to make 47 runs the Aussies felt that they were within a famous white wash.

But the inexperienced Vasbert Drakes and a twenty year old Omari Banks had other thoughts. They batted resolutely positively to surpass the Australian total. What impressed me most was their positive attitude, their desire to win and not to cave in try to save the match by blocking. The Australians like the Englishman bowled outside the offstump and lure them to go fishing, But the manner in which they left those balls was a lesson to our batsman.

The mighty marauding Australians finally succumbed to their own medicine. For years they have systematically mentally warped the opposition by sledging. Every moment of the chase was champagne for a cricket lover. But whenMacGill lobbed one into the slot, and Drakes hoofed it mightily over cow-corner for six was the decisive moment. Though the whole of the fifth day was champagne the one blow from Drakes that went over mightily over stands which brought the noisy crowd to their feet was my champagne moment.

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