Sports Minister Harin Fernando (left) is presented with the shirt of the Galle Marvels by its owner Malav Patel
Sports Minister Harin Fernando was a special invitee at the launch of the re-branding of a franchise team to take part in the fifth edition of the Lanka Premier League (LPL) T20 cricket championship to be held in July.
The announcement of the re-branding of the Galle Gladiators team to Galle Marvels that will be owned by Indian businessmen took place on Monday at the Shangri-La hotel in Colombo. The Galle Marvels will be in the fray for the fifth edition of the LPL to be held in July this year.
Another team called the Moratu Marvels under the same owner will be deployed at the first Lanka T10 tournament that is scheduled to be held in December this year.
At Monday’s launch of the new LPL franchise team Minister Fernando claimed his one desire was to take Sri Lanka to the world through cricket and praised both the new sports investors in the island.
“I like to see franchise cricket in Sri Lanka reach the highest level with other countries. The government will give you a hundred per cent support to make it a success. This is an ideal platform to support tourism and nobody can be more excited than I am,” said Fernando who is also the Minister of Tourism.
He was presented with the team shirt of the Galle Marvels by its trio of Indian owners Malav Patel, Neil Patel and Himanshu Patel who have contracted one of South Africa’s iconic players of the past Lance Klusener as the team’s coach with England’s Alex Hales as the stand-out or iconic player.
