Royal Thomian Masters O50 Annual Encounter in Sydney, Australia 27th January 2020

STC Skipper Richie De Silva receiving the Randy Morrell Trophy from STC OBA NSW Patron Ananda Amaranath

Reporting By Doosra

The Royal Thomian 2020 Masters cricket match was played on Monday 27th January 2020, the day after Australia Day at the Kareela Reserve, Doonside cricket grounds.

This year’s tournament was hosted by Royal.

Thomian Captain Richie De Silva lost the toss and were asked to field first on an extremely sunny & humid day. Thomians found the spring in their step when Indy Gunawardhana at point took a catch inches off the ground off Don Jayasinghe’s bowling to send the Royal skipper Opener Neshan Dias
packing home for 5 runs in the second over of the day. The other opener Aruna Wickremasinghe was soon shown the exit when Jerome Gasperson repeated the display of how to pluck catches off the tormenting bowler, Lal Samuel. Dinesh De Silva who looked in belligerent mood hit two consecutive fours soon followed the openers back to the pavilion by the fantastic glove work of Jeeva Paski, stumped off Don Jayasinghe’s bowling.

Gavin Mallawaarrchi, Radesh Chanmugam steadied the Royal inning after Royal reeling at 5 for 44 looking down the barrel made valiant knocks retiring at 31, 32 respectively. Panjan Nagaratnam batted well for 26 . David Selvan displayed his batting prowess at #9 position to the rest of the Royal batsmen, the art of scoring 38 runs not out when rules require one to retire at 30 with no provisions for last man standing. This error was missed by the scorer, umpires and the adjudicators when deciding individual awards of the after match presentations . This lapse was then brought to the attention of the match adjudicators straight after the game and the individual awards were reviewed and revised in a final adjudication.

Next Two batsmen were out cheaply. Last man Jonathan Krish saw it through to the end of the game, the 30th over. Jeeva Paski finished up with two catches, a stumping and 1-3 off 1 solitary over.

Don Jayasinghe 2 for 26 & Nandakumar 1 for 20 and chief wrecker Lal Samuel took 4-14 off his allotted 4 overs were pick of the Thomian bowlers.
The mammoth target of 184 at 6 runs per over never seemed to phase the Thomians who set about the business from ball one. Partnerships of 22, 17 & 47 ensured a solid base with Jeeva Paski & Nandakumar Jegarajah both retiring at 30 runs each. Niranjan Sundaranathan 20, & skipper Richie De Silva a brisk 14 with a towering six all chipped in handsomely.

There was still work do when skipper De Silva got out with the score at 119 still requiring 69 runs . Indy Gunawardhana then tried to hoick Radsesh Chanmugam out of the park and was stumped leaving 45 runs to get off 11 overs. Ruwan Seneviratne 24 Nout Out & Jerome Gazperson 17 not out with an unbroken partnership of 45 runs saw the Thomians reach with 1.3 overs to spare for the loss of 6 wickets. Both batted sensibly rotating the strike and maintained the run rate required of 6 runs per over.

Five Thomians, Niranjan, Jeeva, Nandakumar, Lal & Richie joined the sixers club whilst Radesh & Rajan from Royal. Notable performers with the ball for Royalists included Praba 1-9 off 2 overs, David Selvan 1-20 off 3 overs & Panjan Nagaratnam 2-35 off 4 overs & Kesara De Costa 1 for 20 off 4 overs. On the field, Jonathan Krish took a catch & a stumping whilst Gavin took the only other catch.

Thomians Lal Samuel for his fine spell of 4-14 & 18 runs was awarded Best Bowler & and Royal’s David Selvan was awarded Best Batsman for his 32 not out after 6 runs was deducted from his original score of 38 due to an error made by the scorer and Jeeva Paski 1-3 off his single over 2 catches, a stumping and 30 runs retired with the bat walked away with the Man of the Match Award.

Thomians retained the Randy Morrell Masters Challenge Trophy quite convincingly in the end.

Special thanks to Team Manager Duke Ramachandran for keeping the team hydrated with drinks supply and running various errands.

Inset (Ruwan Senevirtane & Jereome Gazperson being congratulated by teammate Don Jayasinghe)

Chief Scores
Royal 184 for 8 off 30 Overs
Royal Batting – Gavin Mallawaarchi 31 rtd, Radesh Chanmugam 32 rtd, David Selvan 32 Not Out ,
Prajan Nagaratnam 26
STC Bowling – Lal Samuel 4 for 14 , Don Jayasinghe 2 for 26 , Nandakumar Jegarajah 1 for 20 ,
Jeeva Paski 1 for 3 )

STC 188 for 6 off 28.3 Overs
STC Batting – Niranjan Sundaranathan 20, Nandakumar Jegarajah 30rtd, Lal Samuel 18,
Richie De Silva 14, Ruwan Seneviratne 24 Not Out and Jerome Gasperson 17 Not out
Royal Bowling – Prajan Nagaratnam 2 for 35, Kesara De Costa 1 for 20, Radesh Chanmugam 1 for 16
Praba Siva 1 for 9, David Selvan 1 for 20