Sri Lanka under 19 discard and highest wicket-taker in the current schools cricket season, Lasith Embuldeniya of Royal College, Colombo produced another spectacular bowling performance as he rocked the St. Joseph’s College batting lineup on day one in their 119thannual cricket encounter at Reid Avenue.
The tall left-arm spinner captured 6 wickets for 56 as the team from Darley Road was bowled out for just 131. According to reliable sources, Embuldeniya has picked up 73 wickets so far this season and he is proving the junior selectors wrong with his credible bowling. After Geeshath Panditharathne won the toss and elected to field, right-handed middle order batsman Vimukthi Peiris was the only batsmen from the Josephian camp to middle the ball but he ran out of partners to remain unbeaten on 34. Left-arm spinner Shan Thennakoon and right-arm leggie, Geeshanth picked up 2 wickets each. Royal College in their reply ended the day on a high as they posted 226 runs on the board courtesy excellent knocks of 59 and 43 by opener Naveen Vidanapathirana and Geeshath Panditharathne. Off-spinner Charuka Raveen took 3 wickets for the visitors.
St. Joseph’s – 131 all out in 35.1 overs: Vimukthi Peiris 34*, Revan Kelly 21, Lasith Embuldeniya 6/56, Geeshath Panditharathne 2/16, Shan Thennakoon 2/22.
Royal – 226/8 in 57 overs: Naveen Vidanapathirana 59, Geeshath Panditharathne 43, Charuka Raveen 3/58.