‘USC’ from small beginnings coached top cricketers

By Leslie FERNANDO

CRICKET: He played for a lesser known school - St.Mathew’s College but made use of all the opportunities and U.S.C. Perera - the Captain then has now turned out to be a versatile cricketer and has been appointed as the Colombo North District cricket coach by Sri Lanka Cricket.

Popularly known as USC - he is one of the best products from St. Mathew’s College cricket team as he has brought honour and glory to the school in a big way in cricket, the game he loves so much. He was a fine off-spin bowler, a useful right-hand batsman and a safe fielder.

After his school days, he represented Moors SC, Nomads SC, SSC in the Sara Trophy Tournament (division one) for 17 long years. He has played with a whole heap of top class cricketers _ cricketers like Ghulam Razick, Shabir Asgarally, Dr. S. Sivaratnam, Dr. M. Abeypitiya, D.H. de Silva, D. S. de Silva, D. P. de Silva, Lionel Fernando, Daya Sahabandu, Anurudha Polonnovita, Dr. Sarath Seneviratne, W. L. Withanage, Vernon Caldera, Victor Wickremasinghe, Russel Hamer, Duleep Mendis, Roy Dias, Anura Tennakoon, Wettimuny brothers Sidath, Mithra and Sunil, H.S.M. Peiris, Roger Wijesuriya, Ashantha de Mel, Saliya Ahangama, Guy de Alwis to name a few.

‘USC’ was a member of the Sri Lanka national pool in 1975 and in a trial match he claimed 4 for 29 Represented State Services Cricket team in the Robert Senanayake Trophy Tournament. He has also represented the State Services team against Tamil Nadu - Gopalan Trophy Cricket encounter.

At latter stages, he joined Ceylon Cold Stores and was the captain in Mercantile ‘A’ division tournament.

Two former cricketing stalwarts_ D.H. de Silva, captain Nomads Cricket Club and Neil Perera, one-time Secretary, Board of Control for Cricket in Sri Lanka, spoke glowingly about the cricketing ability and behaviour of ‘USC’ on and off the field.

He holds level one and two coaching certificate and was successful in obtaining Australian level two certificate.

USC was in the Nomads side which won the Sara Trophy under the leadership of D.H. de Silva.

He has shown his ability as a fine cricket coach and have produced several young cricketers to reach a very good standard. He first started coaching at Isipathana College and continued for five years 1992 to 1977. He was responsible for Nuwan Zoysa’s progress. Zoysa was in school and represented the national team.

USC also coached the Sri Lanka Police cricket team from 2001 to 2004 and Police team became State Services Champions 2001-2002. He then coached the Nalanda College team from 2004 to 2006 and helped the school to become schools cricket champions in the Schools one-day tournament.