Joes out to maintain their unbeaten record this year

Chris Dhambarage

St. Joseph’s College with a combination of youth and experience are hoping to maintain their reputation and impressive record in the current inter school under 19 cricket season.

They have been unbeaten for more than three seasons and in that period they have been able to register a good number of victories both at home and away.

In fact they have not lost a game since 2006 where they went down to St. Sebastian’s College Moratuwa while five of their top players were on national duty.

Their latest triumph came last week when they defeated Wesley College outright by ten wickets at Darley Road.

Their success which was also the fourth win for the current season had a great amount of significance because they last defeated the Wesleyites 16 years ago way back in 1994 under the captaincy of Peter Harmer.

St. Joseph’s College had earlier notched up three outright victories against Isipatana College by four wickets, Moratu MV by an innings and President’s College also by an innings. In addition they also emerged champions at the Old Wesleyites six a side cricket tournament held at Campbell Park last year.

They have been quite consistent throughout this season and had first innings honours against Thurstan College, D. S. Senanayake College, Mahinda College Galle, St. Sylvester’s College Kandy, Kalutara MV, De Mazenod College Kandana, Maris Stella College Negombo and St. Sebastian’s College Moratuwa.

This has been a tremendous start for the Darley Road school who will be up against Royal College this weekend in their 113th annual encounter to be worked off at Reid Avenue.

St. Joseph’s College will also take on Trinity, S. Thomas’, St. Benedict’s, St. Anthony’s and Ananda before they confront their traditional rivals St. Peter’s College in their annual Battle of the Saints encounter which is scheduled for March 5 and 6 at the P. Saravanamuttu Oval.

This year of course they will badly feel the absence of dynamic all rounder Shameera Weerasinghe, opening batsman Hareen Silva, Nishika de Silva and Shalindra Perera who all played a major role in forming a great match winning combination.

Last year skipper Shameera Weerasinghe in fact had a memorable season where he completed a unique double while scoring over one thousand runs and also captured over one hundred wickets.

In addition Hareen Silva accumulated over 700 runs while Treshan Rajasuriya finished with 54 wickets.

This time the Josephian bowling attack will be spearheaded by skipper Dinal Dhambarage and Chaturanga Kumara who will share the new ball with Supeshala Jayatilleke and Rosco Thattil providing the back up support.

In fact Chaturanga Kumara has been their main weapon this season and has been the architect of their four victories. He had a six wicket haul in the first innings and has already claimed 43 wickets from nine matches. This was also the fourth occasion that he had picked up more than five wickets in an innings in the current season.

Chaturanga Kumara is also their leading run getter so far having accumulated over 650 runs inclusive of three hundreds and four half centuries at an excellent average of more than 60.

He seem to be continuing from where he left last season where he scored 460 runs and captured 27 wickets from 17 outings.

Skipper and left arm seamer Dinal Dhambarage also had an outstanding season last year where he captured 44 wickets at an average of 19.54. This season he has already claimed 32 wickets from ten matches with a best effort of six wickets for 21.

Meanwhile Rosco Thattil is their highest wicket taker so far having picked up 39 wickets from 11 outings at an average of 14.41. He had a best performance of five wickets for 13 and has claimed more than five wickets in an innings on three occasions. Last season of course he was able to pick up only 22 wickets and scored 322 runs from 17 outings.

Senior player Supeshala Jayatilleke is another fine all rounder where he has been among the runs and has also captured important wickets for the side. He has already picked up 27 wickets at an average of 14.75 and has also scored over 250 runs inclusive of one half century.

Middle order batsman and wicket keeper Jaan Jayasinghe is another half centurion in the side having collected over 300 runs from ten matches. In addition newcomers Keshan Perera and Enrico Silva have also scored one half century each.

Dinal Fonseka, Hemantha Jayasundera, Sachin Hewawasam, Ramesh Vidanarachchi, Kevin Bernadus, Vidusha Jayasinghe, Nishitha Perera and Sadira Samarawickrema are the rest of the members of the squad.