Navin determined to bring more glory to Sri Lanka

BY CHRIS Dhambarage

TWENTY three year old Navin Samarasinghe clinched the senior national squash championships for the third time with a superlative performance at the Sugathadasa indoor stadium courts last week.

The bottom seed made a tremendous impact when he knocked out his arch rival and the reigning national champion Saman Tillekeratne in a marathon five setter in the final which lasted for more then two hours.

His success in this tournament had great significance because this was the first time he had beaten Tillekeratne after four unsuccessful attempts.

Samarasinghe was the runner up to Tillekeratne from 2001 to 2004 having won his first national title in 1999 which he retained it in the following year.

But this time he was well prepared to meet the challenge and was equal to the task as he matched his more experienced opponent with every stroke and move.

In fact Samarasinghe felt that he could have pulled off the final in straight sets because he had won the first set and was leading seven nil in the second set having enjoyed the better of the exchanges.

But more importantly he was fresh and was quite anxious to prove himself after a gruelling training session at the Victorian Sports Institute in Melbourne, Australia.

The nationals in fact was the first major tournament for Samarasinghe for quite some time after spending his time on studies and examinations.

He had put a lot of effort for this tournament where he trained for about five week's under the guidance of Roger Flynn who is the head coach at the Victorian Sports Institute in Melbourne, Australia.

Samarasinghe had the privilege of training along with Cameroon White who is among the top sixteen in the world. There are of course several other top ranked players at the Victorian Sports Institute who are currently involved in various open ranking tournaments in Europe and Asia.

He made his entry into the Victorian Sports Institute two years ago as an invitee after making a fine impression at the Asian junior championships in Chennai, India.

This was probably a turning point in his career as he continued with the good work and went on to receive a scholarship from the Victorian Sports Institute last year.

This has certainly been a tremendous morale booster as he continue to impress at the Institute in search of excellence and more glory. No doubt the expectations are more on him but he is determined to maintain his consistency and to bring more glory to the country.

Samarasinghe emphasised the fact that proper training and guidance is important as any other aspect in an attempt to reach a high standard of the game. He said that at junior level there is a lot of talent in Sri Lanka.

"The junior players need to be trained and guided properly. But I do not see that happening at the moment. Even at senior level there is a long way to go because even for me it is difficult to play over there. If you play a tournament without proper training you could get thrashed because it is so competitive.

"But in the tournaments worked off in Sri Lanka they know who will come into the semifinals and who will play in the final as everything is predictable. But in the overseas there are different tournaments with different players and everyone are almost in the same level".

Samarasinghe said that at the time he launched his career at S. Thomas' College there were some fine players and all junior tournaments were at a very high standard.

"We were more committed to the game as an individual and as a team player. We trained hard and we wanted to play better. Now this is not happening because if there is no coach players do not go for practices. The present day players do not have that desire to go out and train alone and to improve their standard of squash".

Samarasinghe of course was somewhat fortunate because he had the influence of his parents where both Ranjan and Padmini Samarasinghe were associated with the game for a long period and later continued in the administration side of the Sri Lanka Squash Federation.

Both provided great encouragement to Navin by giving him the opportunity to participate in several international junior tournaments.

The international exposure which he received from the young age certainly gave him the courage and the determination to perform even better as he lived upto expectations as a promising player.

Navin Samarasinghe emphasised the importance of competing in more foreign tournaments with the hope of improving the skills and the technique which is a vital part of the game.

"The present set of players participate only in the Asian tournaments and they have not even seen the international players. There is a big gap between Asian squash and the World squash.

There are few Asian players who are among the top rank but that is because they compete in the tournaments in Europe and in Australia quite regularly and have got use the different climate and the conditions".

Samarasinghe produced his best effort when he reached the quarterfinals of the Scottish junior open championships in 1999 and also reached the semifinals of the World junior championships special plate event in Italy in 2001. In addition he was ranked overall third in the Asian Circuit under 19 tournaments worked off in the year 2000.

His next goal is to join the Professional Squash Association some time this year which will give him the opportunity of competing in all major international tournaments.

He is also determined to put up good performance at the forthcoming Commonwealth Games in Australia and is hoping to reach at least the top sixteen.

This will be followed by the South Asian Games in Colombo and Samarasinghe is confident of entering the semifinals in the individual tournament and predicted a silver medal for Sri Lanka in the team championships.