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Busan, Thursday, Sri Lanka stands a better chance of winning medals than the last Games when they field a strong 119-member contingent for the 14th edition of the Asian Games which starts here on Sunday.

Chef de Mission of the Sri Lanka team, Commander H.U. Silva said the expectations are high and that they should come back with better results. Cmdr. Silva said Sri Lanka could pin medal hopes in a few other sports, other than athletics, country's main gold hope. Sri Lankan sailors and rowers, who arrived here yesterday will get down to immediate business. They plan to start their light training from this evening.

Sprinter Damayanthi Darsha will always have sweet memories of the Asian Games. She will be looking forward to win her third successive medal at the Asian Games, having won a bronze in Hiroshima (1994) and two golds in Bangkok (1998).

Up to 1998, Sri Lanka could not win an Asian Games gold medal in more than two decades. Sri Lanka's last Asian Games gold medal, before the 1998 Games, won way back in 1974 at the Teheran Games. But Damayanthi Darsha broke the hoodoo in 1998 with two gold medals in women's 200m and 400m . In 1974, Sri Lanka won two gold medals - in men's 400m and men's 4 x 400m relay. W. Wimaladasa won the men's 400m gold medal in Teheran and 24 years later, young Sugath Tillakaratne aims at an Asian Games gold medal in the same event. Incidently, it was Tillakaratne who broke Wimaladasa's Sri Lanka national record after two decades.

The 4 x 400m relay team which won the gold medal in 1974 comprised W. Wimaladasa, Sunil Gunawardena, Kosala Sahabandu and A.Premachandra.

Only four Sri Lankans won Asian Games medals between 1978 and 1994. They are sprinter Sriyantha Dissanayake (200m silver and 100m bronze at 1990 Beijing Games), Susanthika Jayasinghe (200m silver at 1994 Hiroshima Games), Darsha (200m bronze at the 1994 Hiroshima Games) and golfer Nandasena Perera (in 1990). Jayasinghe and Darsha created history at the 1994 Games in Hiroshima, Japan when they became the first Sri Lankan pair to secure medals at the same event. But the 1998 Games in bangkok belonged to Dharsha, who bagged 200m and 400m gold medals after Susanthika Jayasinghe pulled out after heats due to a leg injury.

The Asian Games, to be worked off from Sep. 29 to Oct. 14, will also be a historic one as rugby too comes to the Games calender for the second time. There will be two separate rugby tournaments - 15-a-side and 7-a-side with two gold medals on offer.

With Japan and South Korea, the Asian rugby super powers in action, Sri Lanka's target will be the 15-a-side bronze medal, which will not be impossible if the Lankan ruggerites play true to form. Though both rugby and cricket were included for the first time at 1998 Commonwealth Games, cricket has never been an Asian Games sport.

Cricket, the most popular sport in South Asia, is unlikely to be included in the Asian Games in near future. Despite several new disciplines being included in the Games calendar, athletics will still get its due place and will be the main attraction of the 43-nation games. In fact, track and field has been one of the compulsory sports and the enthusiasm it generates will be hard to beat.

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