The second ODI Sri Lanka showed that they have found a bowler in tiny Akila Dananjaya who nearly put the skids on the rampaging Indians. When I reminisce I can well remember in 2012, he was brought into the team to play against the touring New Zealanders in 2012. He out of nowhere and he was in the Sri Lankan side. and as he was about to create havoc among the New Zealanders bowling with his off spinners then, Rob Nicol a Kiwi Batsman hit a savage drive back to Dananjaya and the brave Dananjaya tried to take the return catch and missed it and was struck on the cheek, immediately the cheek started swelling and he must have been in real pain as a result his effect was nullified and since then, he was banished into the wilderness, now kudos to our selectors for bringing him and Milinda Siriwardana into the fold.
When I look back Dananjaya he looks a mix between The great Muthiah Muralitharan and the late great West Indian spin bowler Sonny Ramadhin, we saw the assortment of deliveries in his bowling armour. The off break, the leg break, the arm ball, the dipping googley, the flipper, the lot and the boy is only 23 years and newly married. With his liquorice of all sorts we should wish him a bright future.His googly with an awkward grip foxed Kholi, bamboozled Patel, ripped Rahul and bemused all the Indian batsmen.
The ‘x factor’ of Dhoni and the somewhat lucky innings of Kumar saved the day for the Indians. But relentless pressure applied to the Indians would have brought home the bacon for the Lankan’s. Do they have the killer instinct!
Dananjaya with his raw talent should be carefully nurtured. As it happens sometimes he might get over balled as I have seen with Sandakan and then the batsman can spot their bag of tricks or the bowler gets fatigued. It would be interesting to see both of them operating on a helpful track supported by a judicially placed field. Both are young and upperhand, both can be our trump cards in the future if played at the right times. It is over to the captain to capitalise when the team hasthe upper hand because when the team goes to the field it’s his baby, when Virat Kohli is on the field he is “The Master of Ceremonies,” who handles pressure like a “Duck takes to water.” It is also an asset to have Mahendra Singh Dhoni in the back ground who is’ cool as a cucumber.’ Dhoni really master minded the last ODI victory, he was there to see them to the post when most of them were flabbergasted by Dananjaya ably supported by Siriwardana.
The people up above was wise to give Milinda Siriwardana another go and he is on the way to grasping this opportunity to clinch his plays in the team. His innings showed maturity but in the end he threw it away as it always happens; as with Niroshan Dickwella and Kusal Mendis. Chamara Kapugedera batted with a lot of restraint peculiar to him, one can deduce that he played for the team alas his partnership with Sriwardana could not linger for longer.
Kapugedara was playing his 100th ODI, he came to the team as a youngster.I can look back, when he toured Australia and how he put the Aussies to the sword with his swashbuckling innings.He was also the best outfield Sri Lanka had at the time. Kapugedera still has the spunk in him to contribute better for Sri Lanka. His innings of 40 odd was a bit laboured but he must have had his place in the mind, now the selectors sword will spare him this time.
SONNY RAMADHIN
The Houdini of mesmerising spin, slightly built, and sheer wizardry spinning a web of mystery, cap on, long sleeved shirt buttoned at the wrist…Sonny Ramadhin was the original ‘Doosra’ bowler and first player of East Indian descent to represent the West Indies.
He could make the ball turn in either direction by a flick of his fingers and an imperceptible turn of the wrist; his unorthodox attack was the off break spun with the middle finger down the seam; he ran, delivered and followed through in one quick whippy motion, an all-in-one type of action combined with accurate length, unerring direction and crafty variations of flight and pace, But who was Sonny Ramadhin before the start of his meteoric, almost overnight rise to stardom on the world cricket stage in 1950?
He was born on May 1, 1929 in St. Charles Village Esperance Village) described as a most rural of villages, in south Trinidad. He was orphaned at the very early age and was raised along with his brother Ramsamooj, by their grandmother an uncle and an aunt. Theirs was a modest wooden house in a largely agricultural village, hardly a place with any cricketing facilities or cricketing history, yet cricket flourished albeit of the variety with the lime or orange, coconut bat and asphalt or dirt road, bowlers pelting their hearts out and batsmen determined to protect whatever served as the wicket.
The West Indian people had fallen for the mesmerising charms of Sonny Ramadhin. Such was his bowling dominance of that tour of 1950 that in leading the bowling averages he sent down an amazing 1043.4 overs (398 maidens, 2009 runs, 135 wickets, average 14.88 with a best bowling of 8-15). Charlie Davis, known for his spin bowling playing skill, recalls that at a benefit game at the Queen’s Park Oval in the early 70s: “I couldn’t read the man and this was Ramadhin in his 40s and I had not retired as yet!”
My fervent hope is that in Akila Dananjaya we have found a another Sonny Ramadhin!
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