Nilan Ekanayake the weightlifter turned ruggerite-by Althaf Nawaz

Nilan Ekanayake

It is very unusual to witness a person engage and perform exceptionally well in multiple sporting disciplines coinciding with his academic studies, during the school career. Nilan Bandara Ekanayake was another player who started from a rural area and concluded both his education and sports career on a high note, finally ending up playing for the national team in rugby while becoming the cynosure of all eyes.

Nilan was born in 1975 and grew up in Ginigathhena and Kandy. His father Colin Ekanayake was a Planter while Nanda Abeywickrama his mother is a housewife. He has a sister Suranga who is a teacher. Since his father was a planter, he was first enrolled at Don Bosco College in Hatton in 1979 and attended that school until 1980. With his father’s transfer, he was compelled to join Ginigathhena Central College in 1980. Due to limited resources and sporting facilities there, he was admitted to Vidyartha College, Kandy for further studies. He passed the G.C.E. Ordinary Level exam in 1991 and Advanced Level Exam in 1994.

After joining Vidyartha, he launched his sporting career parallel with his studies. He was a member of the college athletics team participating in Shot Putt, Discus and Javelin throw. He was also very particular in maintaining a well built figure and turned out to be a weightlifter. He bagged the silver medal in weightlifting in the Junior National Championship in 1993.

No sooner he joined Vidyartha, his senior students forced him to join the rugby team which was a common practice there to get familiarized with the senior students. Without any previous knowledge in handling the oval shaped ball, he eventually joined the Vidyartha under-17 team and surged ahead to play for the second XV team with Priyantha Gunaratne in 1992. He learnt the basics of rugby from Priyantha Gunaratne and got a regular berth in the First XV teams in 1993 under Sithara Nandasena and in 1994 under Kapila Rajapaksa’s captaincy respectively. These teams were coached by George Jayasena and Sunil Munasinghe.

While playing for school, he was fortunate enough to play for Kandy Youth team coached by Kasthuriarachchi and played for Old Trinitians Sports Club for some time in ‘B’ division club rugby. He was selected to represent the Central Province School Rugby team the same year.

Soon after his school tenure, he decided to play club rugby and one of his friends Clarence Moraes of Havelock Sports Club introduced him to the Park Club. He launched his club rugby career there from 1997 to 2004 playing as a tight head Prop Forward. His coaches were Ana Saranapala and Tony Amit. Due to his fine display as a player in 2004 he was nominated as captain of the Havelocks senior rugby team. He then crossed over to play for CH and FC the same year and scrummed down with them until 2006 under former All Black Jeff Matheson as the coach and Saranga Jayakody as captain.

He got his National call in 2003, when he was playing for the Park Club and played under Pradeep Basnayake and late George Simpkin as the coach. He donned the National jersey from 2003 to 2007 under late George Simpkin as the coach. During that period, he represented the country in 13 International matches. He participated at the 19th Rugby Asiad held in Hong Kong 2004 under the leadership of Pradeep Basnayake followed by the 20th Rugby Asiad in Colombo in 2007 under Jeewa Galgamuwas captaincy.

His professional life started when he was 19 years old as a Sales Representative with ICL Marketing and later worked for over four years with Hemas Marketing in 2000. By passing several milestones, he got promoted to Senior Sales Manager, in his 15-year career with Hemas. In 2016, he changed gears and joined Dialog Axiata PLC as a Regional Manager He is now enjoying life and spends his free time by sharing his knowledge of rugby not only with Vidyartha but also with Maliyadeva College, Kurunegala as a consultant while travelling and reading makes his life enjoyable.

His wife is Dilani Bandara who has been a pillar of strength in his life while the two children are Thevni and Anuki Ekanayake.