Trinity Hoping for another good season

School Cricket

By Hafiz Marikar

Trinity College are looking to emulate their last season’s performance and perhaps even go one better this year. Trinity had a record of eight wins in a row and ended up with ten outright wins, and emerged as the schools league champion last year.
They were also the T20 champions and the runner-up in the 50-over tournament under Akila Jayasundara.  This season they have beaten Kingswood, St. Aloysius, Wesley  and Isipathana outright, and have scored  first innings wins over D.S.Senanayake, Mahanama, Nalanda and  Dharmarajah.
This year, Trinity has the opportunity to play most of their key games at home in Asgiriya including the games against St, Joseph’s, Royal and S.Thomas’. They will also be hosting this year’s Big Match against St Anthony’s.
Leading the side this season is their wicketkeeper Niroshan Dickwella who is also a stylish batsman. Dickwella scored 980 runs last season and also had 50 victims behind the stumps – the figures would have been more impressive had he not missed many games owing to his services being required by the Sri Lanka Youth team. A fourth year player, Dickwella was a recipient of the coveted Lion – the highest award at sports.
His deputy is that talented bowler Janishka Premasinghe who is also in his fourth year and won the ‘Lion’ last season for his superb performance with the ball. His off spin helped him take 78 wickets. He was also a member of the Sri Lanka Youth side.This season he has already accounted for 45 wickets.
The most experienced player in the side is last year’s skipper Akila Jayasundara now playing in his fifth year. He is a gifted all rounder, and has won the coveted ‘Lion’ when he was 16.  Jayasundera has helped the school cricket side in a big way, and his presence will be a great boost to the side.  Last year he was adjudged as the best schools captain.
Another fourth year coloursman is Heshan Wanniarachchi a fine all-rounder who made 460 runs last season. The rest of the batting will revolve around Ron Chandragupta another  all-rounder,  Rajitha Jayatunga and  Dinuk Wickremanayake.
Bhagiya Palihawardana a fresher is one of the opening bats, Amirth Srimaham a left arm opening bowler, Alwin Fernando, Madushan Subendran are two good pace bowlers.  Left arm spinner Lakshan Jayasinghe is also shaping up well and has taken 26 wickets in the matches played this season. Others at practices are Laksitha Dassanayake, Aruna Jayasinghe, Pubudu Samarasinghe, Aviska Dissanayake, and Dimal Koswatte.
The side is coached by Sampath Perera, a product of D.S. Senanayake .  Sampath  played for the Sri Lanka “A” side against   England “A” in 1988, and he also coached his school D.S.Senanayake, and  was the head coach of SCC from 2005 to 2008.
Perera joined Trinity in 2008, when he was picked by Kumar Sangakkara. He is a qualified level one coach; he also did the level two in coaching conducted by Cricket Australia in Sri Lanka,  and did the level two coaching in 2008 conducted by Cricket Australia in Australia.   He also completed the level three high performance conducted by the Cricket Australia in Australia in 2010.
Perera played for D.S. Senanayake College, from 1986 to 1994, from under 13 to 19 and led the school in 1993/94 season.  He had the privilege of scoring 1220 runs in the 1993/94 season with three centuries and eight fifties. He also played for BRC in 1992-94 season in the under 23 tournament. He later represented Bloomfield from 1994-1999.