Central Province lucky to have Zarook

Upananda JAYASUNDERA -Kandy Sports Special Corr.

Central Province has a fine sportsman and sports administrator, Z. M. Zarook who represented Vidyarha College in the fifties, in athletics, cricket, football and hockey.

It was in cricket that Zarook first showed signs of ability when he made 62 runs in the inaugural ‘Big Match’ against St. Sylvesters in 1958 and helped Vidyartha win that historic game by an innings under the captaincy of T.B. Wijesinghe.

However after leaving school, it was in rugby that he really shone. He represented Kandy Sports Club between 1965 and 1969 playing under captains Y.C. Chang, Jayatissa Ratwatte and the late Denzil Kobbekaduwa. His coaches were Maurice Perera and Dr. Sangakkara.

Qualified Coach

Having joined the Kandy Municipal Council, he represented them at cricket between 1963 and 1965 and has a score of 192 against the Health Department. It was not only playing rugby and Cricket, Zarook was keen to give something back to the game and he became a qualified Rugby and a Cricket Coach as well. He also qualified as a Cricket Umpire and is a member of the Central Province Cricket Umpires Association. As a cricket coach, he first started with Gampola Zahira College in the late seventies and switched over as coach of juniors of Madeena Central College, Madawala from 1984 to 1992 and his coaching was well received and Madeena Central became under 15 champions in the Division III tournament in 1985 and the following year became runners-up in the Division II tourney.

Coaching of rugby too occupied a special place in Zarook’s assignment and he first started with Gampola Zahira College between 1978 and 1980 and then switched over to coaching Kingswood College between 1981 to 1989 and his coaching was well received as in that first year as well. Kingswood became champions in the Tyrell Muttiah Trophy Tournament in 1981 and later in 1986 became all island sevens champs. He also coached Dharmaraja College in late eighties and in 1991.

Fine players

At Kingswood he produced some fine players like Ibrahim brothers, Ananda Kasturiarachchi and Lalith Wijeratne and from Dharamraja there was Indrajith Bandaranayake. Zarook is the Vice President of the Kandy District Cricket Association now.