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This could be more interesting than the Bollywood narration of the ‘Slumdog Millionaire’ as this occurred in reality and shaped some of the incidents towards the country’s cricketing future that is today.
Brendon was always a good bat. When he moved to Ananda College, automatically Brendon was given a place in the side over the less enterprising Dhammika in the under 15 team. By the time Brendon moved to the under 17 segment Dhammika found a place in the side and this sequence of order remained until they left school playing for one of the strongest sides in school at that time.
Moreover, this state of affairs did not go that well with Dhammika’s younger brother Arjuna who was known to have very strong family bonds. Yet, being a very clever cricketer Arjuna was always a senior player to those mentioned above. He even went on to represent the country in their inaugural Test at the age of 18+ while still at school.
The former Manager of the Sri Lanka Cricket team Brendon Kuruppu conversing with skipper Sangakkara during Sri Lanka’s last test Vs Pakistan at Galle. |
Maybe for the reason that Brendon was ahead of Dhammika in their cricket turn out, the former was never a favourite of strong man Arjuna. However on December 8 1989 Arjuna replaced former skipper Madugalle who led the Lankan team till their last tour of England in August 1988. Arjuna took the Lankan skipper’s mantle with Lanka’s 1989 two Test tour of Australia.
Moreover as things were Brendon who maintained the status quo walked out Sri Lanka’s opening batsman against New Zealand at the CCC ground in 1987. Transforming his reputation as a dashing opener Brendon plodded on but, accumulated the runs and became only the third Sri Lankan batsman to score a double century, thus making another record of scoring the slowest double century that took a marathon 777 minutes to make 201 not out.
In those formative years of Sri Lankan international cricket Test matches were not common as these days and Brendon played his last Test match against England in England from August 25-30 and was the second highest scorer making 46 runs and also was the top scorer among the top order batsmen that comprised Amal Silva, Athula Samarasekera, Aravinda de Silva, Ranjan Madugalle, Arjuna Ranatunga and Duleep Mendis.
The only batsman who scored more than Brendon in that match was all-rounder Ravi Ratnayake who scored 59 out in the Lankan first innings total of 194. In the Lankan second innings Brendon made 25 runs.
Ironically when it came to Sri Lanka’s very next Test match Brendon was missing from the side and in the side with his younger brother who was the then captain was Brendon’s nemesis Dhammika. Brendon’s Test career was over after four Tests.
The narration was not over at that point. If an innings of forty runs is enough to retain a place in the Lankan side, Dhammika scored 40, 2 and 45 in the two Tests and was chosen to tour New Zealand in Sri Lanka’s next assignment.
If Brendon played four Tests, Dhammika played only two. But, it happened in an ironic manner. Sri Lanka was playing their first warm up game in New Zealand when Dhammika was hit on the fingers by a promising nineteen-year-old fast bowler which resulted in a fracture. (Dhammika’s injury caused many-a-ripple between the then captain Arjuna and manager-on-tour Stanley Jayasinghe but, it does not come into this part of the narration).
However the fourth estate learned that Brendon who was among the runs was the first choice replacement, but it was another Anandian Chandika Haturusinghe - essentially a middle order batsman at that time who was sent in as replacement.
Haturusinghe was pushed in as opener and grabbed the opportunity with both hands scoring 23 and 81 in the second Test, 13 and 74 in the third Test and 66 and 25 in the next Test match that Sri Lanka played against England. Both Brendon and Dhammika were forgotten. (Yet Haturusinghe was also never a blue eyed boy in the dressing room).
By and by the cricketers entered their post cricketing era and sought positions in the administration.
Arjuna by then had developed into a very strong captain and yielded a heavy clout and this resulted in Dhammika becoming the Chief Executive Officer of the Board of Control for Cricket in Sri Lanka, for a short period.
Arjuna also aspired to become the God Father of Sri Lanka cricket, but, it became a reality but, not by cricketing means, but by a political somersault. Sadly this was also a limited edition.
Brendon also entered Lankan cricket management and was involved with Sri Lanka cricket as manager of Junior Cricket from around 1997 to 2002.
In 2004 Brendon was once again recalled, but this time as the manager of the national squad and held that post till May 15 2005 till the administration under Jayantha Dharmadasa removed him.
Arjuna’s somersault saw him replacing Dharmadasa and his eleven month tenure ended with Sports Ministry secretary S. Liyanagama taking the reins and upon his ascent Brendon was once again appointed Manager of Sri Lanka from 16 January 2009.
This part of Brendon’s role as manager becomes more significant as a result of a certain incident.
The second T20 World Cup began in England on June 5, 2009 at Lord's. The Lankan lads did well to enter the final and were the runners-up to Pakistan. During the WC the Lankan cricketers had been approached by certain bookies and the Lankan lads had maintained their resolve and after much deliberation had made a complaint to the cricket manager - Brendon.
However some of the cricketers were not in favour reporting the matter to the SLC because the Lankan hierarchy also has some officials that have bookie connections.So the Cricket Manager within his rights wrote directly to the ICC and did not divulge any of this to his Lankan counterparts. This resulted in senior ICC investigator Alan Peacock arriving in Sri Lanka and interviewing the concerned cricketers and finding out whether they had done any wrong. Besides this, the ICC had forwarded a letter to the SLC on the exemplary handling of this delicate issue by the Lankan cricket manager.
However no one knows what transpired thereafter, but, Brendon was asked to change his hat as a national selector and replacing him with former Sri Lanka skipper - mild mannered Anura Tennekone, however this time behind the scene was another Ranatunga - the secretary and brother of Arjuna, Nishantha. |
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