The 5 Greatest Sri Lankan Cricketers of All Time
One of the most popular sports in Sri Lanka is Cricket. The game is played at both professional and recreational levels. International cricket matches are watched by a massive number of fans. There are also a good number of punters using their PA online casino promo codes on Cricket to win some cash. Sri Lanka is among the top five nations that have ever won a cricket world cup. Here are five of the most celebrated and greatest Sri Lankan cricketers.
Mahela Jayawardene
Mahela is a former captain of the Sri Lankan cricket team. He was a master in playing spin bowling. Mahela’s highest test score was 374 against South Africa. It was against a right-handed batsman. His test cricket debut was in 1997, followed by his One Day International debut the following season. He is the first Sri Lankan cricket player to ever score10,000 Test runs. Together with his teammate, Sangakkara, he recorded the most partnership runs for the third wicket in tests and scoring 5890 runs. This achievement surpassed the 5826 runs made by Rahul Dravid and Sachin Tendulkar during the match against Pakistan at Galle International Stadium.
In 2006, the International Cricket Council named him as the best International captain. He was also nominated as the best Test cricket player of the year. Statistics also reveal that he is the most common bowler and fielder in the history of Test Cricket.
Lasith Malinga
Malinga is a professional Sri Lankan cricketer. He is specialized in bowling with a unique round-arm action, which is sometimes known as a sling action. It earned him the nickname “Slinga Malinga” or “Malinga the Slinga.” Malinga is best known for his ability to take consecutive wickets. He is the only bowler worldwide to have two World cup hat-tricks, the only bowler to have taken three hat-tricks in ODIs and the only player to have taken four wickets in four consecutive balls in any form of International Cricket.
He bowls at a speed of around 140km/h (87mph). He retired from Test Cricket on 22 April 2011.
Muttiah Muralitharan
Muttiah was rated as the greatest Test Match Bowler ever by Wisden Cricketers’ Almanack in 2010. He holds the world record for the most wickets in both test and one-day Cricket. He was the only Sri Lankan to be inducted into the ICC Hall of Fame. He also won the Ada Derana Sri Lankan of the year in 2017.
He is one of the most successful bowlers in the game. He held the first position in the International Cricket Council’s player rankings for Test bowlers for 1,711 days spanning 214 Test matches.
To add on being the best bowler, he was the sixth international franchise player signed to the Caribbean Premier League and the first Sri Lankan player to be named to the new Twenty20 tournament.
Kumar Sangakkara
Sangakkara holds numerous battling records. He scored 28,016 runs in international Cricket across all formats in 15 years. He also broke records as a wicket-keeper, even though he no longer kept wicket by the time he ended his Test career. At the moment, he is the second-highest run-scorer in ODI cricket and the fifth-highest run-scorer in Test cricket.
Another achievement is that he maintained his first position in the ICC Test batting rankings between 2005 and 2015. He was placed at position 5 in the ICC Test rankings. In a public poll conducted by Cricket Australia in 2016, Sangakkara was rated as the greatest ODI player of all time.
In 2015, Sangakkara became the highest ever ODI run-scorer. He surpassed Sanath Jayasuriya, who held the previous record of 13,430 runs. He also broke the ODI wicketkeeping record that was previously held by Adam Gilchrist.
He is considered the best batsman in the history of Cricket.
Sanath Jayasuriya
Sanath Teran Jayasuriya is a former captain of the Sri Lankan national cricket team. He is famous for his powerful striking and match-winning all-round performances in One Day International cricket.
Jayasuriya is regarded as one of the best all-rounders having scored over 12,000 runs and captured over 300 wickets in One Day International cricket. He was named the most valuable player in 1996 by the Cricket World Cup.
He retired from Test Cricket in December 2007 and from limited overs cricket in June 2011. He was appointed as the chairman of the cricket selection committee in 2013. In 2014 during his tenure, Sri Lanka won the ICC World Twenty20. He will always be remembered as one of the world’s greatest cricketer.