The new club cricket season will commence on December 1st, 2014 with six 50-over matches to be played on various grounds around Colombo and its suburbs.
The 2014/15 season will start off with the limited-over tournament which will be followed by the main league and the season will be spanned over 4 months to decide the domestic winners in white ball and red ball cricket.
The limited-over tournament will see 14 teams divided into two groups of seven teams in each vying for honours. The top two teams from each group will then proceed to the semi-finals and the final is scheduled to be played on 20th December at R. Premadasa Stadium.
Defending champions, SSC led by stylish left-hander Dimuth Karunarathne have been drawn in group A alongside Ragama CC, Army SC, Tamil Union, CCC, Saracens SC and Badureliya CC. Lahiru Thirimanne has been assigned as Ragama CC skipper but due to his national commitments another left-hander, Udara Jayasundara is tipped to lead the team. The Soldiers will be led by the batting all-rounder Asela Gunarathne while Jeewan Mendis has been appointed as the Tamil Union captain yet due to his international commitments; the replacement has not been officially announced. All-rounder Milinda Siriwardene has crossed over to Badureliya CC from Colts CC and he will lead his new team. Dark horses, CCC will be skippered by experienced Hasantha Fernando while the newly-promoted Saracens SC have named left-arm spinner Upul Indrasiri as their captain.
Last year’s runner-up NCC led by Sri Lanka discard Upul Tharanga will be a major force to reckon in group B while they will face stiff competition from top teams such as Colts CC, Moors and Bloomfield. Colts CC will surely miss their national stars including their skipper Dilruwan Perera while hard-hitting all-rounder Dilhara Lokuhettige will lead a strong Moors outfit. Dynamic batsman Ashan Priyanjan will once again captain the SL Ports Authority CC team while off-spinner Suraj Randiv has been bestowed with captaincy responsibilities at Bloomfield C&AC. Achira Eranga and Sahan Wijerathne will skipper Sri Lanka Air Force CC & Chilaw Marians CC respectively.
Last season’s four semi-finalists; SSC,NCC, Colts and Ragama will once again start as favourites to enter the knockout stages yet clubs like Moors, Tamil Union have the potential to upset one of the big teams in the coming weeks. The monsoon rains might play a pivotal role in the group stages and it will be interesting to see the infrastructure levels of the domestic cricket in Sri Lanka during the rainy season.
With the current Sri Lanka vs England tour going great guns, many players will be eager to put up noteworthy performances before the selectors name the 30-man provisional squad for the ICC World Cup on or before 14th of December.
Talented left-hander Niroshan Dickwella of NCC finished as the highest run-scorer during the 2013/14 tournament with 437 runs in 8 matches with an average of 54.63 and a top score of 133 while Kaushal Silva of SSC ended on 2nd place with 353 runs in 6 innings and he held a superb average of 88.25. Two left-arm seamers, Nilanka Premarathne (Ragama CC) and Charith Jayampathy (SSC) ended as the joint top wickets-taker scalping 18 wickets each.
