Best Bowler Outstation:

Ruwantha Kellapotha captured 108 wickets this season

By Leslie FERNANDO

CRICKET: Ruwantha Kellapotha, the captain of St. Thomas College, Matale who had the rare feat of capturing 108 wickets during the 2009-2010 schools cricket season, was the Best Bowler Outstation in the 32nd Observer-Mobitel Schoolboy Cricketer of the Year Contest 2010.

The panel of umpires picked him as the Best Bowler Outstation for his fine bowling during the season.

Ruwantha Kellapotha - a fine allrounder.

Ruwantha’s right-arm leg-spin bowling troubled opposing teams’ batsmen. The fourth-year coloursman became the first Thomian cricketer from Matale school to capture over 100 wickets.

In addition to winning the Outstation Best Bowler’s award, Ruwantha was also selected runner-up Best Allrounder and Runner-up Outstation Schoolboy Cricketer of the Year.

The consistent performer, Ruwantha took 5 wickets eleven times and a match haul of 10 wickets on 3 occasions. His best bowling figures in an innings - 9 for 77 and a match bag of 12 for 124 was against Royal College, Panadura - the Best Team Outstation 2010.

Ruwantha’s driving force has been his ability to maintain an excellent line and length and aided by a temperament where he can bowl for long spells and keep the batsmen in check.

Earlier during the 2008-2009 schools cricket season, Ruwantha also performed well capturing 87 wickets with his best being a match haul of 10 for 82 against Kegalu Vidyalaya.

. Scored 779 runs

In addition to his bowling, he has been among the runs scoring 779 runs playing in 16 matches and 21 innings. He has scored five half centuries, 87 against Trinity College, 86 against St. Paul’s College, 93 against Kegalu Vidyalaya, 94 against St. Anne’s College and highest score of 96 against Dharmaraja College. He is also a good fielder and excels in the close catching positions.

As the captain of the school’s under-19 team, he has led the side in a fitting manner. Under his leadership, St. Thomas College, Matale recorded five outright victories, eight first innings wins, one match drawn while lost two games.

Ruwantha has played in the college under-12 (2003), under-14 (2004), under-15 (2005) under-17 (2006) and 2007 and for under-19 from 2005 to 2010. It is somewhat unique to play in the senior team under-19 for six consecutive years. He has captained the college teams in the under-15, under-17 and under-19.

He had the honour of captaining the Matale District Schools team in 2007 in the under-19 tournament and also had the distinction of captaining the North Central Provincial teams in the under-17 and under-19 tournaments.

At last year’s ‘Big Match’ against Science College, Matale, Ruwantha won the Best Batsman’s award for scoring a fine century (103).

He is in the Central Province Cricket ‘pool’ and will be representing the Province in the SLC and SLSCA conducted under-21 inter-district cricket tournament. He is also in the National Development Pool.

Presently he is turning out for Ragama CC in the SLC under-23 cricket tournament and he is one of the key players in the team. Already he has shown a lot of promise with the bat and ball and is certain to achieve good success and he is bound to go for national honours in the future.

Ruwantha thanked college Principal Dampiya Wanasinghe, coaches Saman Senanayake, Lakshitha Herath, S. Subasinghe and Jagath Wasantha for helping him to achieve success. He also thanked his teammates and supporters and his parents for extending great support.

He paid tribute to the ANCL and Sunday Observer for organising the contest for all these years. He also commended the sponsors Mobitel for supporting the budding cricketers.