The Mobitel Observer Cricketer of the Year awards this year moves into a new chapter with the interest shifting to looking at ways to award the girls who perform well this season. This will also encourage them to commit themselves wholeheartedly to the game. A total of 36 girls schools are fielding teams in the under-19 tournament divided into seven groups. The knock-out final round enabled 18 teams to qualify.

Another former Observer-Mobitel Schoolboy Cricketer Kusal Mendis almost came up with a match winning performance as he has done on many occasions before. He was on the way to score a well deserved century and victory for Sri Lanka if not for that silly running between the wickets. He ran the first run too slow to start with and the England stumper noted that and pointed to the fielder to throw at the further end. For Mendis’ bad luck, the ball hit the wicket with a direct throw by Leach.

With the schools cricket season about to unfold the 41st Mobitel Sunday Observer Schools cricketer contest was launched with the generous support of Mobitel. Chairman of Lake House Wasanthapriya Ramanayake and head of operations of Mobitel Telecom Nalin de Silva were present. This year however, the event reaches a new phase and will be looking out for the best boy and girl cricketers of the year to encourage and foster more girls’ schools to take to the game. Sri Lanka’s women cricketers are having fluctuating fortunes at present and need more players of high quality to take over and perform better at national level. Sri Lanka also needs high quality schoolboy cricketers as did in the past. They could match any team in the world in that age category during the early years, but of late this has not happened.

The atmosphere was electric as our stars took to the stage to entertain the audience and to celebrate the youngsters who came out tops at the 40th Observer/Mobitel Schoolboy Cricketer of the Year.