Sanath Jayasuriya

Sanath Jayasuriya

       

       Sanath Teran Jayasuriya (Sinhala: සනත් ටෙරාන් ජයසූරිය, born 30 June 1969) is a former Sri Lankan cricketer and a current member of the Parliament of Sri Lanka.Jayasuriya was an all-rounder, who had an international cricket career that spread over two decades. He is the only player to score over 12,000 runs and capture more than 300 wickets in One Day Internationals, and hence regarded as one of the best all rounders in the history of Limited overs cricket. He was named the Most Valuable Player of 1996 Cricket World Cup and Wisden Cricketers' Almanack broke an age old tradition by naming him one of Five Cricketers’ of the Year 1997 despite not playing the previous season in England.Jayasuriya was also the captain of the Sri Lankan cricket team from 1999 to 2003. He retired from test cricket in December 2007 and from limited overs cricket in June 2011.Sanath Jayasuriya has the distinction of playing in third most ODI matches in which his team was on winning side,just behind Sachin Tendulkar and Ricky Ponting. Sri Lanka Cricket appointed him as the chairman of cricket selecting committee on 28 January 2013.

Jayasuriya ran for public office at the 2010 Sri Lankan general elections and was elected to the parliament from his native Matara District. He topped the UPFA parliamentary election list for Matara district by obtaining 74,352 preferential votes.

He is now serving as a deputy minister of Postal services in the UPFA government led by Mahinda Rajapaksa.

Early life

             Sanath Jayasuriya was born in Southern Sri Lankan city of Matara, to the family of Dunstan and Breeda Jayasuriya. He has an elder brother, Chandana Jayasuriya. He was educated at St. Servatius' College, Matara, where his cricketing talents were nourished by his school principal, G.L. Galappathy, and cricket coach, Lionel Wagasinghe. He excelled in cricket while at St. Servatius College, Matara and was picked as Observer Schoolboy Cricketer of the Year in the Outstation Segment in 1988. He was also picked as the Best Batsman and Best All-rounder in the Outstation Section. Jayasuriya also represented Sri Lanka in the inaugural ICC Under-19 Cricket World Cup which was held in Australia in 1988. Jayasuriya was subsequently selected for a tour in Pakistan a few months later with the Sri Lanka 'B' team where he made two unbeaten double centuries. Shortly afterwards he was drafted into the national side for the tour to Australia in 1989–90. He made his One Day International debut against Australia at Melbourne on Boxing Day of 1989 and his Test debut against New Zealand at Hamilton in February 1991.