Deshabandu Deshabandhu (; ) is the third highest Sri Lankan honours system, national honour awarded in Sri Lanka. It is awarded "for meritorious service". The title is held by no more than 150 living holders at any time. It is conferred with a citation and ...

Handunnettige Deepthi Priyantha Kumar Dharmasena (born 24 April 1971) is a Sri Lankan

cricket Cricket is a Bat-and-ball games, bat-and-ball game played between two Sports team, teams of eleven players on a cricket field, field, at the centre of which is a cricket pitch, pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two Bail (cr ...

umpire An umpire is an official in a variety of sports and competition, responsible for enforcing the rules of the sport, including sportsmanship decisions such as ejection. The term derives from the Old French , , and , : (as evidenced in cricke ...

and former international cricketer. He is a member of the Elite Panel of ICC Umpires and the first person to participate in an ICC Cricket World Cup final both as a player and an umpire. A right-handed batsman and a right-arm

off break Off spin is a type of spin bowling in cricket. A bowler who uses this technique is called an off spinner. Off spinners bowl with their right-arm and a finger spin action. Their normal delivery is called an off break, which spins from left to ...

bowler, Dharmasena was a member of the Sri Lankan side that won the

1996 Cricket World Cup The 1996 Cricket World Cup, also called the Wills World Cup 1996 for sponsorship reasons, was the sixth Cricket World Cup organised by the International Cricket Council (ICC). It was co-hosted by India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. The tournament wa ...

Playing career

Dharmasena was born in Colombo on 24 April 1971. He started his cricketing career as a teenager at Nalanda College Colombo. His first foray into international cricket was in 1994 in a Test match against

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. Its Provinces of South Africa, nine provinces are bounded to the south by of coastline that stretches along the Atlantic O ...

. His obscure action made him perfect for bowling in one-day matches, yet Dharmasena also proved a useful batsman, especially after he was investigated in 1998 by the ICC for overstretching his bowling action to illegal proportions. Having been cleared in July 2000, he played for the one-day team on several occasions since, but rarely played Test cricket. Dharmasena was the 59th Sri Lankan cricketer to receive a Test cap (Sri Lanka v South Africa at Colombo Sinhalese Sports Club 1993). Kumar Dharmasena has the record for playing the most number of ODI innings before being dismissed for a duck (72 innings). He along with Dulip Liyanage set the record for the highest 8th wicket runstand for Sri Lanka in ODI cricket (91).

Umpiring career

Following his retirement as a cricketer in November 2006, Dharmasena announced plans to become a competitive umpire, as he wished to remain "close to the game which I love so dearly". Prior to his retirement, he had already umpired several domestic matches in the Sara Trophy, the major first-class cricket tournament in Sri Lanka. He umpired his first international match in 2009, overseeing the

one-day international One Day International (ODI) is a format of cricket, played between two teams with international status, in which each team faces a fixed number of fifty overs, with the game lasting up to 7 hours. The World Cup, generally held every four yea ...

between India and Sri Lanka at the Rangiri International Stadium in Dambulla: he remains the youngest ever Sri Lankan to umpire any international match. He umpired in the

2011 Cricket World Cup The 2011 ICC Cricket World Cup was the tenth Cricket World Cup. It was played in India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh, while the latter hosted World Cup matches for the first time. India won the tournament, defeating Sri Lanka by six wickets in the 2 ...

, and was appointed to the Elite Panel of ICC Umpires later that year. Dharmasena was named the Umpire of the Year at the 2012 ICC Awards, receiving the David Shepherd Trophy. He was selected as one of the twenty umpires to stand in matches during the

2015 Cricket World Cup The 2015 ICC Cricket World Cup was the 11th Cricket World Cup, a quadrennial One Day International (ODI) cricket tournament contested by men's national teams and organised by the International Cricket Council (ICC). It was jointly hosted by Aust ...

and umpired in the final. In doing so he became the first to play in and to umpire World Cup finals. He stood in the

final Final, Finals or The Final may refer to: *Final examination or finals, a test given at the end of a course of study or training *Final (competition), the last or championship round of a sporting competition, match, game, or other contest which d ...

of the 2016 ICC World Twenty20. Kumar Dharmasena has worked as an umpire in 18 matches of ICC World T20, the most by any umpire from Sri Lanka. In January 2019, he won the David Shepherd Trophy for the ICC Umpire of the Year at the 2018

ICC Awards The ICC Awards is an International cricket award presented annually by the sport's governing body, ICC. The first awarding ceremony was held on 7 September 2004 in London, England. Between 2009 and 2014 the awards were known as the LG ICC Aw ...

. In April 2019, he was named as one of the sixteen umpires to stand in matches during the

2019 Cricket World Cup The 2019 ICC Cricket World Cup was the 12th Cricket World Cup, a quadrennial One Day International (ODI) cricket tournament contested by men's national teams and organised by the International Cricket Council (ICC). The tournament was hosted bet ...

. In July 2019, he was named as one of the two on-field umpires for the second semi-final match, between

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

and

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. Later the same month, he was also named as one of the two on-field umpires for the Cricket World Cup Final. England won the match in a Super Over. He admitted an error at a critical moment in the match, but said he did not regret it. Had the right decision been made, England would have required 4 runs instead of 3 to win off the last 2 balls. He also umpired the final match of the

2022 ICC Men's T20 World Cup The 2022 ICC Men's T20 World Cup was the eighth edition of the Men's T20 World Cup, formerly known as the ICC World Twenty20. It was played in Australia from 16 October to 13 November 2022. In the final, England cricket team, England beat Pakist ...

between Pakistan and England. In September 2023, he was named as one of the sixteen match officials for

2023 Cricket World Cup The 2023 ICC Men's Cricket World Cup was the 13th edition of the ICC Men's Cricket World Cup, a quadrennial One Day International (ODI) cricket tournament organized by the International Cricket Council (ICC). It was hosted from 5 October to 19 ...

Records

* Dharmasena is the one of two people (alongside Richard Illingworth) to have played in a Final of the

Cricket World Cup The ICC Men's Cricket World Cup is a quadrennial world cup for cricket in One Day International (ODI) format, organised by the International Cricket Council (ICC). The tournament is one of the world's most viewed sporting events and consid ...

as well as officiated in the final of the World Cup. He had played in the 1996 Cricket World Cup Final and featured as an on-field umpire twice in

2015 2015 was designated by the United Nations as: * International Year of Light * International Year of Soil __TOC__ Events January * January 1 – Lithuania officially adopts the euro as its currency, replacing the litas, and becomes ...

and

2019 This was the year in which the first known human case of COVID-19 was documented, preceding COVID-19 pandemic, the pandemic which was declared by the World Health Organization the following year. Up to that point, 2019 had been described as ...

World Cup finals.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Dharmasena, Kumar 1971 births Living people Sri Lanka One Day International cricketers Sri Lanka Test cricketers Sri Lankan cricketers Cricketers at the 1996 Cricket World Cup Basnahira North cricketers Nondescripts Cricket Club cricketers Bloomfield Cricket and Athletic Club cricketers Sri Lankan Test cricket umpires Sri Lankan One Day International cricket umpires Sri Lankan Twenty20 International cricket umpires Alumni of Nalanda College, Colombo North Central Province cricketers Sri Lanka Cricket Combined XI cricketers Deshabandu Cricketers from Colombo

Playing career

Umpiring career

Records

See also

References

External links