All signs point to hectic finish though Navindu continues to occupy top slot 

The race to the top between Navindu Nirmal and Mohamed Najath is intensifying. The All-Island Schools segment of the Dialog 4G-the Sunday Times Most Popular Schoolboy Cricketer of the Year 2017 competition could get hotter as the weeks move on. 

By the seventh week both contestants have been able to surpass the 30,000-vote mark as Lasith Croospulle too has made indications that he is also keen to get into the fray. 

Navindu of St. Aloysius College, Galle takes his tally to a massive 37,394 after adding up 22,550 votes combined by coupons and digital voting by the ended week. He retains the top spot for yet another week with a healthy gap of 7,141 over Zahira College’s Najath. Najath added 16,950 combined votes to reach 30,253. 

Claiming the third slot is Croospulle of Maris Stella College with a tally of 19,364. He received 11,328 in the ended week but has a long way to reach to catch up with the leaders. Charana Nanayakkara of Thurstan College dropped down a place to fourth while Santhush Goonathilake of St. Peter’s College moved to fifth place. S. Thomas’ College skipper Romesh Nallaperuma too lost a place and moves down to sixth while Dinitha Basnayake of St. Benedict’s College remains in the seventh slot. Royal skipper Helitha Vithanage gains three places from last week to climb to eighth and Lakshina Rodrigo of St. Peter’s loses a place and comes down to ninth. At tenth is Sahan Suraweera of Ananda College, who also lost a place from last week. 

By the seventh week the number of schoolboy cricketers in contention in the All-Island Schools segment has reached 31 with four new entrants. The list will remain open until the end of March, where it will be pruned down to the Top 20. By the end of April the list will be pruned down to 15 and by the end of May it will be cut down to the Top 10. This will apply to all categories of the competition. 

Pulitha Yasas Sri Sarathchandra of Sri Sumangala College, Panadura continues to dominate the Emerging Schools category and he is nearing the mark of 1,500 votes. This category too has a good number of ten contestants. The International Schools category is occupied by the sole contestant Shimraz Shahil of Alethea International School. 

Important to note is that coupons for the competition will be published in the Sunday Times, the two English dailies, the Daily Mirror and Daily FT, and the two Sinhala dailies, Daily Lankadeepa and Ada. Coupons will run for 26 weeks with the deadline set for the week beginning on 2 July. Readers can vote for their favourite schoolboy cricketer and take them to the winning post during that period. 

Dialog Axiata has introduced a digital version with an online voting system through an online portal to vote for the Most Popular Cricketer (www.dialog.lk/cricket/register). 

Players who wish to enter the fray will have to confirm their participation by registering online at www.dialog.lk/cricket until 28 February. Even schoolboy cricketers whose names are already in the competition, included by reader votes, must register before February ends. Online registration entries will be strictly received only until 28 February. For online voting visit www.dialog.lk/cricket. Both coupon votes and online votes will be counted on a weekly basis and the official results will be published every week in the five newspapers and its websites as well as that of Dialog Axiata’s online portal. 

The deadline for online voting will be the same as for the coupons. Valid coupons for each week will only be received until noon on Thursday of each week. Online voting for each week will be counted by noon on Thursday of each week.