By Brian Thomas
Anura Tennekoon celebrates his 78th birthday on 13th October . He is one more forgotten hero, and sadly, the world did not have the opportunity to watch him bat because he was in the 70 ‘ s era , and at that time, ICC had not considered Sri Lanka as a full member only an associate hence in the bygone era , minows never got the opportunity to showcase their talent on the global arena.
The modern-day cricketer is not only blessed with overflowing finances , especially the Indians , but extra protective gear , better and wider bats , and of course sponsors and media hype that tag them as ” Kings ” ” Prince ” ” Hit Man ” ” Wall” and many more. India is the ideal team to represent if a player is seeking money.
Fame and Power.
Anura was a humble human who captained his alma mater, St Thomas’s College Mount Lavinia , represented Ceylon Tobacco in a competitive Mercantile tournament, played division one cricket for SSC , captained Sri Lanka in the 1975 and 1979 edition of the World cup. This talented righ hander with exquisite technique was given an opportunity to play only 4 ODI matches in which he made a fantastic 57 against a strong bowling attack of New Zealand.
Sri Lanka were minows back then , but Anura Tennekoon , his near perfect technique , beautiful cover driving abilities , his excellent footwork , the way he negated quality spin attack using his crease was a treat to watch. I remember renowned coach Berty Wijesinghe telling me how he compared Mavan Attapathu and Anura Tennekoon with the same measuring tape because they were the two batters to emulate if a batter is looking to be technically sound.
Anura un 61 first class matches made 3481 runs with a highest score of 169 , playing for the SSC. I remember the late Daya Shabandu, a fine left arm dual-purpose bowler who was a batters nightmare stating to me on the Cricket Show that both Michael Tissera and Anura Tennekoon were the most difficult batters to bowl to rating them as World class players , because Bandu as he was popularly known bowled to many international batters during his tenure playing for the All Ceylon team during the golden era. Sri Lanka had many classy batters , Anura was among the top four for sure. He ended up being a cricket administrator as CEO of Sri Lanka Cricket , manager of the national team during the World Cup back in 2011.
I was proud that I had the golden opportunity to work under him as the media manager for the team. He was too humble to be true. Soft spoken, spent hours with Sanga , Mahela, and our strong batting unit , I guess the conversation revolved around technique and application as at that time we had a challenging World Cup , and ended up as runners up. Late Ranil Abeynaike, my co-host, during our Cricket Show era , always kept reminding me that in his books, Anura was one of the most technically correct batters he played along side at the SSC. Let’s all wish Anura a happy birthday to many youngsters. Sadly, they missed out watching a genius, but to all of us who have watched him play his legacy will never be forgotten.
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