Royal charge leaves ‘Thora’ black and blue

By David Stephens

The Sunday Times: A S. Thomas’ College fleet, which had been navigating troubled waters throughout their second innings, was sent plunging to a seven-wicket defeat by a ferocious bowling barrage from Reid Avenue, as Royal College roared to victory at the 134th Battle of the Blues, to clinch the D.S Senanayake Trophy  at the SSC grounds yesterday.

Royal’s triumph brings their tally of victories to 34, leveling the score with their traditional rivals, who have also secured 34 wins, and ending a six-year result drought. The Thomians, who were bowled out for 192 during their first innings, were blitzed out for a paltry second innings total of 132 after they were put in to bat by the Royalists, who began the day with a 68-run lead following their first innings declaration at 260 for 5.

Chamika Karunaratne continued with his lethal first innings’ form, tormenting S. Thomas’ batsmen with a host of unplayable deliveries to finish the day with 4 for 32, to end his Royal-Thomian adventure with an astounding match bag of 9 wickets. His performance earned him both the Man-of-the Match and Best Bowler accolades, and effectively propelled his team toward the finish line. The only fact worth bragging about for S. Thomas’ was Devin Jayasinghe’s Best Batsman award, but that will do little to soften the blow of this humiliating defeat.

S. Thomas’ were bullied throughout the day, and lost Nipuna Gamage in only the sixth over of the day when he had his stumps rearranged by Hashen Ramanayake. The Royalists followed their early breakthrough with another decisive blow two overs later, when Devin Jayasinghe, who scored 74 in the Thomians’ first innings, was sent marching back to the pavilion for a duck after he hooked a delivery off Ramanayake straight to Roanaka Ahangama.

This brought skipper Javed Bongso to the crease, and for a while he and opener Deelaka Herath steadied the ship with some clever and controlled strokeplay. However, the time had come for Karunaratne to announce his presence, and he did it with a scorcher of a delivery which bulleted into Bongso and trapped him in front of the wicket for 19, leaving S. Thomas’ on 60-3.

The warning sirens were wailing for the Thomians, and reached an ear-splitting pitch when Herath, who had played sensibly for 25, was caught behind by keeper Milan Abeysekera and Tilaksha Sumanasiri joined him back in the pavilion after being run out by a brilliant throw into the stumps by fresher Harith Samaringhe for 5.

S. Thomas’ were struggling at 78-5 by lunch, holding only a very flimsy 10-run lead. Royal was now clearly in the ascendancy and the pressure was beginning to pile on S. Thomas’ batsmen. It eventually told on Helakamal Nanayakkara when he edged to leg slip off Poorna Aluthge for 3 runs.

The only ray of hope for S. Thomas’ came from Sanesh de Mel, who had come to the crease after the departure of Herath and was battling it out with that time-honoured Thomian grit. However, Royal Captain Devind Pathmanathan- (the nephew of Gajan Pathmanathan, who played for Royal in 1971 and 1972 and represented the University of Cambridge and the UK Combined Universities team) together with Aluthge were slowly tightening the screws on S. Thomas’.

They eventually crumbled within the space of a few overs, as Madushan Ravichandrakumar (1) and Ravindu Tillakaratne (0) were dismissed in quick succession to have S. Thomas’ hobbling at 100 for 8.

De Mel was still the lone warrior for S. Thomas’ and was edging towards a half century. His only problem was that he was running out of partners as new man Sahan Wijesinghe, who had crawled to 5 off 30 balls, was bowled by leg-spinner Harith Samarasinghe.

With the score on 132-9, de Mel was one run short of his fifty. His haste to reach the milestone may have contributed towards the end of his team’s innings, as he rushed for a single that was never there. The result: his latest partner Ishan Kularatne was run out for 0, leaving Royal a total of 65 for victory.

With tea a little less than an hour away, Royal were almost assured of victory, barring a sudden shower which did not appear to be coming. Paceman Nanayakkara, did his best to deliver a miracle with figures of 3 for 30, claiming all of Royal’s second innings wickets, but a Royal victory was now beyond doubt and Abeysekera sealed proceedings with a cracking four off one his loose deliveries.  Upon the Royal victory a spokesman for Royal College said that in keeping with tradition the school will declare a holiday for its students on Monday due to the Royal victory.

       Pix by Amila Gamage