The first and only international baseball umpire from Sri Lanka, Sujeewa Wijayanayake, has been picked by the World Baseball Association to officiate in the under-12 World Baseball Tournament from July 29 to August 7 in Taiwan.
Only nine referees have been invited to this year’s World Championship from among one hundred baseball associations. Accordingly, it can be considered as an achievement for Sri Lankan Baseball that Wijayanayake has been recognized by the World body as an exceptional international umpire.
Players from eleven countries including USA, Japan, Korea, Taiwan, Mexico, Panama, Czechoslovakia, South Africa, Dominica and Italy are competing in this tournament.
Wijeyanayake’s first engagement as a judge was in 2018 to officiate at the World Baseball under-18 tournament held in Korea. The next big one was when he was made the main referee in the final match at the Japan National Baseball tournament that ended recently.
He was also made the technical operations manager of the baseball and softball tournaments held at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. (TBR)