With nothing special to brag about, Ananda College and Nalanda College are set to move into their 93rd Battle of the Maroons cricket encounter to be played on March 4 and 5 at the SSC ground in Colombo.
In this year’s match the Anandians will be led by fast bowler Nethma Samaraweera, who is a third year player while the boys from Nalanda will be skippered by batsman Chanul Atukorala who is a fourth year coloursman.
At present Ananda leads the series with 12 wins while Nalanda has seven wins under their belt and 73 matches have ended in draws.
After a wait of 69 years, Nalanda beat Ananda at last year’s encounter.
This season Ananda played 15 matches and they won only three matches against Zahira College, St. Joseph Vaz College Wennappuwa and Dharmaraja College Kandy. They lost four matches and the other matches were drawn.
Nalanda on the other hand played 15 matches this season and won just two games against Dharmaraja and Dharmapala College Pannipitiya while the rest were drawn.
Viduna Wijebandara (493), Iruth Gimshan (450) and Kithma Vithanapathirana (407) passed the 400 run mark this season. Vithanapathirana also took 41 wickets while Ashinsha Nainayake had 37 wickets and scored 293 runs. Ayesh Shashimal took 28 wickets and made 284 runs while Isuru Ayesh plucked 27 wickets and scored 231 runs.
This season Nalanda’s Rusiru Vilochana scored 1192 runs with two centuries and seven half centuries and was the first batsman to reach the 1000 runs milestone while the other run makers were Sadew Samarasinghe (611), Yasiru Samarakoon (562) and Eranga Jayakody (505).
Minod Caldera with 46 scalps is the highest wicket taking bowler while Sajitha Withanage (39) and Janula Indusara (29) were also among the wicket takers.
The limited overs match between the two schools for the late P. de S. Kularatne Trophy will be contested at the same venue on March 12 for the 46th time with Ananda leading the series with 26 wins while Nalanda has 15 wins. (YK)