Hiran Wickremasekera 1,000 runs
in 2009, 2010 and in 2011

CRICKET: Nineteen year-old St. Anthony’s College, Kandy’s cricket captain Hiran Wickremasekera carved his name into the record books when he became the first schoolboy batsman from the hill capital to score a thousand runs in a season for three successive years.

It is not known whether this has been achieved before this by any schoolboy. Hiran Wickremasekera scored a thousand runs in 2009 and followed it up in 2010. The third four-figure mark came earlier this week.

But this season there was a bit of hiccup as many of the matches were interrupted by inclement weather. The Antonians could not play Ananda College, Royal College and Dharmaraja College due to foul weather and these matches had to be cancelled.

He had scored 972 runs at the end of the big match and 28 more runs needed to reach this magical figure but it hung like the sword of Damocles, not knowing what would happen next.

Then this week came the match against Lumbini College and Hiran Wickremasekera seized this opportunity to score the 28 runs need for the thousand run mark.

In the past the Antonians have produced a large number of run getting machines like Wijepala Premaratne, Ranjith Doranegama, S. W. Senaviratne, Charlie Joseph, C. P. P. Raj just to name a few but none of these batsmen were able to score a thousand runs for three successive seasons.

His feats are that in 2008 he scored 365 runs and scored 1171 runs in 2009 which included 3 hundreds. In 2010 he scored 1144 runs and this included two centuries but scored 8 fifties. In 2011 he made 1011 runs and this included 4 hundreds, with a top score of 150 against Kingswood. Another little known fact is that, fielding in the slips he has held 45 catches this season.

Arvinda Premaratne - bowler with 105 wickets

CRICKET: Nineteen-year-old right-arm off-spinner Arvinda Premaratne of St.Anthony’s College, Kandy, became the first and only schoolboy bowler from Kandy to capture over hundred wickets this season.

He achieved this feat when he captured 7 for 53 against Lumbini College, Colombo this week. He may have reached this milestone very much earlier if not the inclement weather conditions experienced in the hill capital in the months of December last year and January this year which resulted in three of their traditional matches against Royal College, Dharmaraja College and Ananda College being cancelled.

Arvinda Premaratne, playing in his third year for the school, did not meet with much success in his first year. But in his second year which was in 2010 he was able to capture 38 wickets. But this season, he turned to be virtually unplayable running through the opponents batting. He has captured 105 wickets and in one match with 6 for 16 against Panadura Royal College as his best figures.

He is a consistent bat too scoring around 500 runs. At club level he has played Sara trophy cricket for Kandy Youths and performed well with bat and ball.

Arvinda Premaratne is full of praise for his coach Champika Siriwardena and national spin coach Piyal Wijetunga for chiselling his rough edges.

He hopes to continue his cricket for a club playing in the Premier League, so that exposure would help him to perform better.

St.Anthony’s College has produced a very large number of spinners including the world best off spinner the legendary Muthiah Muralitharan, and who knows with proper guidance and improving his skills, he could be a successor to Muralitharan in the near future.