Hamish Paternott excellent cricketer, athlete and ruggerite-by Althaf Nawaz

Hamish Paternott

Some of the yesteryear sports personalities have a proud record with regard to their school career, where several generations of them had their academic career in one school. Hamish Spencer Paternott, one of the leading sportsmen produced by St.Peter’s College, Colombo was one of them, where his father followed by his three brothers represented the same school and excelled in both education and sports there.

Hamish who is in his sixties is the son of late Norman Paternott who contributed as a prolific Cricketer for St.Peter’s while becoming the first Cricket Captain of the school later turned out to be a businessman. Irene Paternott (nee Rozairo) was his mother who was a housewife. He was born with five other siblings with Patrick his eldest brother being a top athlete representing

College in several meets. Aubrey his second brother was a second row forward who donned the jersey for College and holds a proud record of scoring the highest number of tries for Havelocks in a season in 1967 in his position. Rodney his third brother has the rare distinction of captaining the college Rugby and Cricket team concurrently in 1968, later locked horns for CH and FC. His two younger sisters are Neliya De Jong (nee Paternott) wife of late Jeffrey De Jong lives in Australia while Patricia lives in the United States of America.

Hamish credits his father, who was the first Peterite cricket captain as his biggest inspiration in his life, who was his mentor in encouraging to take up sports. He also acknowledges the pivotal role played by his elder brothers, all accomplished sportsmen themselves, who influenced him to step into Rugby, Cricket and Athletics.

Hamish initially launched his illustrious sporting career as a mere twelve-year old school boy in 1964 and went on to Captain the College Cricket team at that age category. He went on to play under several captains at the senior level including Tony Opatha in 1967, in 1968 under Rodney Paternott, in 1969 under Denham Jurianz and in1970 under Rory Inman, which he rates as the ‘Golden era of Peterite Cricket’ and went on to play for the Colombo Schools and President’s XI teams respectively. He had a short stint in Athletics at St. Peter’s College and went on to compete in the Colombo Schools Athletics meet in 1970 in the 400 metres event.

He embarked on his school’s rugby career in 1966 with the Second XV team at the age of 14 years. Next year he was promoted to play in the first XV team under Ronnie Guneratne and went on to establish a regular place in the team. In1968, he played under Rodney Paternott and in1969 under Sunil Perera (son of Archibald Perera who coached and produced many great rugby

players). He finally led the College rugby team in 1970. Some of his team members then were Ravi Emmanuel, Jeffrey DeJong, Kumar Bastianpillai, Mifta Mohideen (halfback at school and club rugby), Neil Maurice, Roy Dias, Jeremy Beiling, Nihal Weeratunga, C.L DeSilva, Harry Benedict, Shariff, Brian Obeysinghe

Soon after he left College, he joined CH and FC in 1971 and played under Brian Baptist as skipper followed by DarrelWimalaratne’s captaincy in 1972. His other team mates were Noel Brohier, Lanil Tennekoon, Bryan Baptist Upali Vithanage, LorenszPereira, Rodney, Mike Hauk and Tony Amit few to be named in which year they were league champions winning 11 matches out of 14 and were edged out 9-12 in the Clifford Cup final by Police

He was called for National duties in 1972 while playing as wing three quarter at the Rugby Asiad in Hong Kong under Y.C. Chang’s Captaincy. That team consisted of Desmond Harridge, Dr. Maiya Gunasekera, Hafi Abdeen, Hadji Omar, Reggie Bartholomeusz, Bumpy Jayasekera, Ronnie Schokman to name a few. He also played against the visiting London Welsh, The Australian Emus and the Paris

University teams due to the limited overseas tournaments.

He played his final season for CH and FC in 1973 under Bryan Baptist before migrating to Australia.

He would like to extend his sincere gratitude to Darley Ingelton, father in law of Noel Brohier who was one of his coaches. In

Australia he Played for Dandenong XV in 1974/75 season. In 1978, he played for the Harlequin Rugby Club while in 1979 and 80 Captained Box Hill Rugby Club First team.

Cheryl is his wife (nee Speldewinde) who stood as a pillar of strength in his ups and downs. Tennille Dias , Lauren Figeuirado , Hayley Arnott and Aisha Paternott are his four children while he is blessed with nine grandchildren.