Chamari Athapaththu, Shashikala Siriwardena, and Oshadi Ranasinghe were the prominent female cricketers to be honored in the annual Sri Lanka Cricket awards 2019.
Chamari Athapaththu won 4 awards which included the prestigious Woman Cricketer of the Year. Chamari has been performing well for the national team and was the only positive for the Lankans from a disappointing tour of Australia. But Chamari as a batter had shown great promise. She had hit a hundred in each ODI and T20I formats in that tour, both the series which they lost to hosts Australia.
Athapaththu has also been awarded the Best Batswoman and Best All-rounder in ODI as well as the Best Batswoman in the T20 category.
Shashikala Siriwardena, who captains the national team in ODIs, bagged 2 awards. She was selected as the Best Bowler and Best All-rounder in the T20 category.
Seam bowler Oshadi Ranasinghe was given the award of the Best Bowler in the ODI format.
The Sri Lanka Cricket Board handed out awards to the domestic cricketers as well. It awarded female players from Women’s Division 1 Limited Over tournament. Yasoda Mendis from Air Force SC was given the Best Batter award while Inoka Ranaweera from Navy SC was given the Best Bowler award. Chamari Polgampola from Air Force SC was selected as the Best All-rounder. Chilaw MCC and Navy SS were declared the joint champions.
In the men’s category, Dimuth Karunarathne, Lasith Malinga, Thisara Perera, Dhananjaya de Silva, Isuru Udana, Dilruwan Perera, and Kusal Perera were some of the awardees.
Kumar Dharmasena was given the umpire award in the international category while Lyndon Hannibal was awarded the same prize in the domestic category. Manoj Mendis was given the match referee award in the domestic panel.
(Source: Sri Lanka Cricket)
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