Asela Gunaratne, former Cricket Captain of Sri Rahula College,Katugastota has been selected to the Sri Lanka test squad for the tour of Zimbabwe now in progress. He started his cricket career under Aubrey Kuruppu, former cricketer of St.Thomas’ MT.Lavinia and Central province.
Asela scored a century in his second appearance in his school career when he scored 157 against St.Aloysius ,Ratnapura in the year 2003. In the following year, he scored 106 against Ananda Sastralaya,Kotte. As a captain,he brought a great victory to Sri Rahula College over St.Anthony’s Katugastota in the limited over tournament in 2005. In that particular match he scored 52. In the same year he scored 127 in his first Division III cricket match against Madawala United as a 17 year old lad.
Asela improved tremendously after joining the Sri Lanka Army . He was a prolific scorer for the Army in domestic premier league matches. After joining the Army he was selected for the Sri Lanka team at the Asian games.
He also had the distinction of being selected to represent the Counrty in the One Day match Vs India in India. He scored 58 for Sri lanka against Australia in a 3 day warm up game and represented Sri lanka ‘A’ against West Indies in the recently concluded test matches. He is the 3rd player from Kandy to be selected to the current Test squad.
Others are being 19 year old Lahiru Kumara,old boy of Sri Sumangala, Kandy and Niroshan Dikwella, old boy of Trinity College,Kandy.