Thurstan come out as favourites

45th Isipatana - Thurstan cricket encounter:

BERNARD PERERA

The 2008 Schools Cricket season opens its Big match series with the 45th Isipatana vs Thurstan big match scheduled to begin at the Sinhalese Sports Club ground today.

Thurstan College takes the top position with five victories in the series while their opponents Isipatana has only four wins under their belt with thirty four games have ended in draws. In the past it was only one game that was not played in this series.

Isipatana this season have played 14 matches and recorded only a single win. Lost a game drew ten matches and gained two first innings wins. The six wicket victory was against Lumbini Vidyalaya. On the other side Thurstan College has a better record having won five games.

They also had five first innings wins and seven draws from 14 games played this season.

This record proves that for today’s game Thurstanites come up with a good morale and are expected to push forward for a win to take their tally to six wins for the series.

Isipatana who face their rivals will have to come up with a superlative achievement to stop Thurstanites victory march.

Though Thurstan lead the series their last victory was recorded in 1992 under the leadership of Mackenzie Perera, while Isipatana’s last win was achieved in the year 1992 under the captaincy of Krishantha Jayawardene.

Isipatana’s Saman Nishantha holds the record for the highest score in this annual encounter which he achieved in the year 2002 scoring 150.

Thurstans top score 146 was made by Kamal Mahendra in 1990.

In the bowling Jayajeeva Karunaratne best achievement done in 1992 to have figure reading at 7/28.

Isipatana’s Ifran Ismail is the batsman who can make a good score to trouble the Thurstanite bowlers who are trying make inroads for a win. Ismail playing in all games this season has tally of 461 runs to come for the game with an average of 23.05.

The other bastmen who could pose a threat are skipper Chirantha de Silva Amila Rabel and Thivanka Ranasinghe too have performed well with the bat for Isipatana.

The highest wicket taker being Chamara Waduege much is expected from him.

He has 27 wickets under his belt for an average of 18.48.

He will have the support from Vimukthi Deshapriya and Thiwanka Ranasinghe who has done well in this department.

Thurstan College is looking for Geeth Kumara to boost their total with a good batting performance in this game which is of vital importance for his to record a win here.

He is the only batsman to score a century this season and has an aggregate 465 runs to his credit.

All eyes will be focused on him during this game as he is capable of upsetting the Isipatana bowlers. If Geeth fails, the burden will have to be shouldered by the other two batsmen Umesh Karunaratne and Buddhi Samarawickrama who too have used the willow to score some valuable runs for their team.

The bowlers of Isipatana should not give chance for these batsmen to settle down at any stage of the game if they are to save the game coming in as underdogs for this 45th encounter.

Both teams will have to play a cautious game provided the weather gods permit two full days of cricket to be witnessed by the large crowds expected for the game.

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De Mel chief guest

Chief Selector Sri Lanka Cricket Asantha de Mel will be the chief guest for the 45th annual cricket encounter between Isipatana Vidyalaya and Thurstan College which is scheduled to commence today at SSC ground.

De Mel who played for the Schools First XI team later went on to represent the country. During his school cricket career he was voted as the Best Bowler in the Observer-Bata Schoolboy Cricket Award competition. The guest of honour at the match will be another distinguished old boy Jagath Alwis.