Cricket: Youngsters can stay plugged into the sport with Campus Cricket, says Mahanama

“Tournaments such as Red Bull Campus Cricket can help university-age cricketers stay active in sport, while they juggle studies and ­edging professional careers” says former ex-ICC match referee Roshan Mahanama, who believes too many young cricketers quit the sport after finishing school, because of a lack of cricket tournaments and opportunities for sports people aged 18 to 23. 

He says many promising cricketers are lured away from the sport by other career prospects, and are unwilling to wait around for a spot on a senior team. 

Mahanama is a Goodwill Ambassador for this year’s Campus Cricket World Final, in which six teams from around the world play in a week-long tournament held in Colombo from September 23 to 29. 

“Campus Cricket has been running for six years, and I thought this is one of the areas we need to support, because in Sri Lanka we lose a lot of cricketers from ages 18 to 23,” Mahanama says. 

“We don’t have proper tournaments for them, and we scrap those age-group competitions. It’s a career choice for many of these players, and parents are also involved in these decisions, and sometimes it’s easier to pursue another career and stop playing cricket. If we can encourage them to continue playing the game, that’s a good thing.” 

Although cricketers in Sri Lanka are particularly likely to quit sports soon after leaving school, largely because the domestic system does not cater for the many young players who are not yet ready to graduate to first-class cricket nations around the world are trying to tackle the problem of losing promising sportspeople in their university years.