Old Boys Quadrangular cricket and basketball

The 39th annual cricket quadrangular 2006 and the inaugural squad basketball tournament organised by the old bens sports club are scheduled to take place on October 21 and 22nd at the St. Joseph’s and St. Peter’s College grounds respectively.
The main squad matches between the old boys of the four schools will be played over 50 overs while the Veterans overs 40 years matches will be played (25 overs per side) at the Bloomfield grounds Reid Avenue.

President of the Old Bens S. C. Kumar Sabaratnam said at a press briefing held in connection with the tournament that it was the Bens that started a tournament of this nature in 1963 and since then it has been conducted alternately and successfully at the other three schools venues. He said that due to the renovation of the Bens grounds at Kotahena, they had to keep away from their grounds.

Ranjith Samarasekera the former Old Antonian and Colts cricketer who is the chairman of the technical committee said that the main purpose of the event is to bring goodwill among the four leading catholic Institutions which have produced great cricketers of yesteryear. He further said that initially the tournament was conducted as two day games but later they switched on to one day games. The matches will be played according to normal limited over laws with only the run up restricted to 15 yards for a bowler.

The basketball tournament will be conducted at the St. Benedict’s courts and it will be played for the Fr. Joe Wickremasinghe Memorial Trophy. The runners-up will be awarded the Old Bens squad trophy.

The Old Bens Squad team comprising old boys will be led by Carman Mapatuna and the veterans team will be captained by Nevin Noyar. The Old Antonians will be captained by Daminda Kolugala and the veterans team will be led by former Test wicket keeper Mahesh Gunatileka.

Prashan Liyanage will lead the Old Joes Quadrangular squad while Rohan Wijeratne will captain the Veterans Team. Riyaz Farook will lead the Squad team and Dayan Madawela will captain the Old Peterite team in the veterans tournament. Shirley Wickremasinghe (President Old Antonians Colombo Branch), Lalith Ganlath (President Old Joes SC), Suranga Senerath (OBA St. Peter’s), Angelo Fernando (Secretary OBA Old Bens) were also present at the press conference.

(RA)