Bloomfield from rags to riches

Dilanka Mannakkara

The prestigious Bloomfield club which is one of Sri Lanka's oldest and most distinguished clubs has produced many national cricketers who have brought fame and glory to the country. The much loved Bloomfield clubhouse and grounds is now in dire straits and the enthusiastic and cricket loving executive committee which was elected recently plans to revamp and renovate the whole club to bring back the glory from the old days.

Newly elected President Hirantha Perera is passionate about restructuring the club and the grounds which needs immediate improvements in facilities."Our membership dropped by a staggering amount from 400 to almost 60 during the last year due to the poor facilities of the club,our committee's main task is to upgrade the ground,player room,clubhouse facilities and make Bloomfield the prestigious club it was before" said Hirantha.

The club and especially the grounds looks a sorry state as the famous ground is virtually a pool now due to poor drainage facilities.'We are going to immediately look in to that and we have informed the CMC about this"said well known cricket coach Jayantha Senevirathne who is the Vice President of the Club. The much loved clubhouse which looks like a an tiny low class restaurant needs immediate attention as well. Hirantha has already installed a brand new LCD in the club house replacing the ancient 15' inch television which was there for sometime. He also mentioned that the clubhouse would be upgraded very soon with more recreational facilities and a modern clubhouse so that members would come there often. He wants the bar to be fully air conditioned and also have a billiards room as well.

The dressing room facilities are also very poor with not adequate toilets and even chairs for the players.

The scoreboard is also in pieces and is about to fall and the new committee also intends to put up a brand new,modern scoreboard. The main hindrance the club faced was that they were short of finances and after much trouble the new committee has managed to get a sponsor for the club. The negotiations have been very successful with DIMo which is a blue chip company and in the near future DIMO would sponsor the cricket team. Incidentally the club has managed to get a sponsor only after 12 long years. The new committee assured to Daily News that after a few months they would totally upgrade the whole club so that it would again be among Colombo's elite clubs. They also hope to invite all past cricketers to the club and to join as members. They also plan to host a member's night once a month so that the club members and their families would have a fun filled time.

History of Bloomfield

The Club was inaugurated 117 years ago in the 18th century in 1893 and began in the racquet court at Pettah, presently Chalmers Granaries. The first President being Mr. Fransis De Crester, Secretary Alden Van Geyzel and the first Captain was Walter De Crester. Thirty years later the club was compelled to move to Campbell Park in 1923 due to an urban expansion. The club had to do in a pint sized area and a wooden hut on wheels as its pavilion. All the same Bloomfield catered to less affluent schoolboys from the neighbourhood and rose to great heights in cricket activities despite many shortcomings.

Bloomfield has the proud distinction of producing Sri Lanka's first Test Captain in Bandula Warnapura . Apart from this rare distinction, Bloomfield produced a host of other Sri Lankan players like, D.S.De Silva, Jayantha Seneviratne, Lalith Kaluperuma, Ajith De Silva, Anura Ranasinghe,Susantha Karunaratne, Sunil Jayasinghe, D.L.S De Silva, Roshan Mahanama, Pubudu Dassanayake, Ruwan Kalpage, Saman Jayantha, Kumara Dharmasena to name a few and from the current players, Sanath Jayasuriya, T.M.Dilshan, Chamara Silva, Prasanna Jayawardena, Chintaka Jayasinghe, Tharanga Lakshita in the Sri Lanka squad.