Cricketer, curator, coach and commentator

Life and times in sports by Premasara Epasinghe

Abeynaike and S. Thomas College, Mount Lavinia, seem to be hand in glove and Abeynaike father and son, seem to have a destiny to share with S. Thomas's. When I puzzle out this statement relating to the story it will astonish most cricketers in Sri Lanka and as well as the cricketing fraternity. Both of them - coaches of S. Thomas' College. They assisted the Thomians batsmen to score more runs, bowlers to take more wickets, fieldsman to take more catches and save more runs and especially mould them as gentlemen.

Let us look at this story step by step

In terms of public schools of the calibre of Eton and Harrow, the closest we have in SL are Royal and S. Thomas' Colleges.

Abeynaikes of STC

Abeynaike, father and son, has brought credit and honour to S. Thomas' College. Both represented the College First XI. Later, both served the college as cricket coaches. Both of them had the proud distinction of coaching the Teams, that beat their archrival - Royal College.

In the 85th Royal-Thomian; the Team was coached by Orville Abeynaike, of S. Thomas. They defeated the Royalist captained by J.D. "Shaw" Wilson. Thomians were led by Premalal Goonesekere. Orville Abeynaike advised his captain to declare at tea without batting for another 20-30 minutes. Mind you, he advised Premalal, when Sriyantha Rajapakse was scoring freely and unbeaten at 40. 262/6 - S. B. Seneviratne 96. Royal scored 152 in the first essay and collected 179 in the second innings. Thomians notched up the necessary runs and won by 8 wickets. STC - 2nd innings 70 for 2 wickets.

A couple of weeks back, his son Ranil Abeynaike as the coach was instrumental in beating Royalists by an innings and 38 runs in two days on 11th March, 2005 at the SSC.

It must be a unique record in this series - Royal-Thomian, for a father and a son as coaches to beat Royal.

Orville A. Abeynaike was an outstanding schoolboy cricketer in 1941. He represented S. Thomas' College, under the captaincy of R. Proctor. Other members of the Thomian team were, N. T. Wijesooriya, R. Selvaratnam, A. F. Molamure (scored 113 in the Big Match), Vernon Prins, (former All Ceylon captain) B. Saravanamuttu, E. D. Cortelingam, R. Abeysekera and S. Elapata.

Orville was a fine opening bowler. He opened the Thomian attack with Vernon Prins.

In the 62nd Royal-Thomian, played on 20th & 21st March 1941, Orville Abeynaike captured the wickets of H. T. Gunasekera, T. Murugeser, M. N. Jilla, O. W. Wambeek and T. W. Wickramasinghe and M. A. Macan Markar - returning the figures of 25.2-30-7. In the 2nd essay he captured the wickets of H. T. Gunasekera and S. G. Salgado and his bowling analysis read 20-6-36-2. A match bag of 9 for 66. A great achievement indeed.

Orville Abeynaike was highly respected Teacher at S. Thomas' College. He was one of the best coaches and a Master-in-Charge of cricket and he also served as a selector of the Sri Lanka School Cricket Association in 1968/1969.

I was very fortunate to associate him closely in the late 1960s, as the Master-in-Charge of Cricket and Prefect of Games of Nalanda. Further, two of us, were selectors of the Sri Lanka Schools Cricket Association in 1968/1969. Orville was one of the nicest gentlemen that I have come across.

Orville's son, Ranil Abeynaike joined S. Thomas' College in 1963, played junior cricket and graduated into the first XI. He was born on 12th February 1955 in Colombo. He played three years for College and captained college in 1973. His rival captain in the Royal-Thomian was Ajita Pasqual, the present General Manager cum Chief Executive of Seylan Bank.

In the 1973 Royal-Thomian he captured the wickets of M. Muller (1), R. T. de Silva (7), J. Amarasinghe (1) and S. S. G. Lawton (9) and returned the figures of 26-12-36-04. In the second innings, he bowled 26 overs, captured 2 wickets for 72 runs. His victims were T. Chelliah (81) and M. Muller (3).

Lassie, David and Ian coached Ranil

Ranil Abeynaike learned the finer points of the game from greats like Lassie Abeywardane, a legend at STC, David Ponniah, who represented S. Thomas' in 1931 - 1932, and P. I. Pieris, former Cambridge University and Sri Lankan player, who held the prestigious position of the Presidency at the Board of Control for Sri Lanka Cricket in 1989 and 1990-1991.

I still remember as a schoolboy at Nalanda, I witnessed the 74th Royal-Thomian played at the Oval on 13th & 14th March, 1953, the brilliant record breaking for the fourth wicket between skipper P. I. Pieris (123) and Geoff Wijesinghe (64) (Editor Daily News). Royal was captained by Ubaya de Silva and Thomian won by innings and 34 runs.

After playing for SSC in the Big League, Ranil Abeynaike won his "Ceylon Cricket Colours" when he was selected to play against England in 1977. England side consisted of great cricketers like Tony Greig, Bob Willis and Kieth Fletcher.

Ranil Abeynaike played in 14 matches and in 19 innings collected 412 runs and remained unbeaten on 2 occasions. His highest score was 66.

He bowled 882 balls, captured 9 wickets for 360 runs.

In the limited overs version, in 9 matches, in 4 innings, scored 136 runs.

He bowled 27.2 overs, 5 maidens, captured 2 for 115 runs.

Ranil Abeynaike represented Sri Lanka in 1977 against England. The England team consisted of greats like Tony Greig and Kieth Fletcher.

Foreign exposure

From 1978-1982, Ranil played Professional cricket in England representing Bedfordshire Minor county. Later, he proceeded to Australia and played for Seddon CC, Parkdale CC, Sri Lankan cricketer Sanath Kaluperuma too played with him.

Curator

Who is a curator in cricket language?

In a nut-shell, curator is a person who maintain and prepare Turf wickets and practice Turf wickets. He have to maintain and prepare the outfield as well as. He is overall in charge of the entire ground management.

Ranil Abeynaike is a highly qualified curator in Turf Management and obtained the highest qualification from Tafe College, Australia. Today, he is the curator of SSC.

In 2002, he took over the post of Junior Coach and presently he is the First XI coach of S. Thomas' College.

Like father like son

Like his father, Ranil is also a thorough gentleman. His wife Roshika is a tower of inspiration to him. As a commentator, he project a genuineness. Those who see and hear him, cannot help, but, think here is a person talking to us, from the bottom of his heart, where cricket is enthroned.

Many a time, I was his partner at the Box. It is a treat and a pleasure to be associated with him in the Box. His knowledge of the game is fantastic. He never misses a ball. Today, he is an International Commentator, which we are proud of.