Ranil Gemunu Abeynaike (12 February 1955 – 21 February 2012) was a Sri Lankan

cricket Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by st ...

er. Abeynaike was a right-handed

batsman In cricket, batting is the act or skill of hitting the ball with a bat to score runs and prevent the loss of one's wicket. Any player who is currently batting is, since September 2021, officially referred to as a batter (historically, th ...

who bowled

slow left-arm orthodox Left-arm orthodox spin, Left-arm off spin also known as slow left-arm orthodox spin bowling, is a type of left-arm finger spin bowling in the sport of cricket. Left-arm orthodox spin is bowled by a left-arm bowler using the fingers to spin ...

. Born at

Mount Lavinia Dehiwala-Mount Lavinia ( si, දෙහිවල-ගල්කිස්ස, translit=Dehivala-Galkissa; ta, தெஹிவளை-கல்கிசை, translit=Tehivaḷai-Kalkicai), population 245,974 (2012) is the largest suburb of the City of ...

, he was educated at S. Thomas' College Mount Lavinia, in the

Dominion of Ceylon Between 1948 and 1972, Ceylon The Sri Lanka Independence Act 1947 uses the name "Ceylon" for the new dominion; nowhere does that Act use the term "Dominion of Ceylon", which although sometimes used was not the official name. was an independent ...

(today Sri Lanka). He was the son of Orville Abeynaike.

International career

Abeynaike made his first-class debut for the Mercantile Cricket Association against the Pakistan Under-25s. His first first-class match for

Sri Lanka Sri Lanka (, ; si, ශ්‍රී ලංකා, Śrī Laṅkā, translit-std=ISO (); ta, இலங்கை, Ilaṅkai, translit-std=ISO ()), formerly known as Ceylon and officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, is an ...

came against

Tamil Nadu Tamil Nadu (; , TN) is a state in southern India. It is the tenth largest Indian state by area and the sixth largest by population. Its capital and largest city is Chennai. Tamil Nadu is the home of the Tamil people, whose Tamil languag ...

in the 1974/75

Gopalan Trophy The M. J. Gopalan Trophy was an annual first-class cricket competition played between Ceylon Sri Lanka (, ; si, ශ්‍රී ලංකා, Śrī Laṅkā, translit-std=ISO (); ta, இலங்கை, Ilaṅkai, translit-std=ISO ()), ...

. A further first-class appearance followed in 1976, when he was a part of the Sri Lanka Board President's XI team which played the touring Pakistanis. A year later he appeared for Sri Lanka in a first-class match against the touring

Marylebone Cricket Club Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) is a cricket club founded in 1787 and based since 1814 at Lord's Cricket Ground, which it owns, in St John's Wood, London. The club was formerly the governing body of cricket retaining considerable global influenc ...

, who he also made his

List A List A cricket is a classification of the limited-overs (one-day) form of the sport of cricket, with games lasting up to eight hours. List A cricket includes One Day International (ODI) matches and various domestic competitions in which the numbe ...

debut against.

English County Cricket

In 1978, Abeynaike joined English county

Bedfordshire Bedfordshire (; abbreviated Beds) is a ceremonial county in the East of England. The county has been administered by three unitary authorities, Borough of Bedford, Central Bedfordshire and Borough of Luton, since Bedfordshire County Council ...

, making his debut against

Cambridgeshire Cambridgeshire (abbreviated Cambs.) is a Counties of England, county in the East of England, bordering Lincolnshire to the north, Norfolk to the north-east, Suffolk to the east, Essex and Hertfordshire to the south, and Bedfordshire and North ...

in that seasons

Minor Counties Championship The NCCA 3 Day Championship (previously the Minor Counties Cricket Championship) is a season-long competition in England and Wales that is contested by the members of the National Counties Cricket Association (NCCA), the so-called national cou ...

. Following the 1978 season, he returned to Sri Lanka where he made two List A appearances for the Sri Lanka Board President's XI against the touring

West Indians A West Indian is a native or inhabitant of the West Indies (the Antilles and the Lucayan Archipelago). For more than 100 years the words ''West Indian'' specifically described natives of the West Indies, but by 1661 Europeans had begun to use ...

. Over the coming seasons he continued to play in England for Bedfordshire, playing

Minor counties The National Counties, known as the Minor Counties before 2020, are the cricketing counties of England and Wales that do not have first-class status. The game is administered by the National Counties Cricket Association (NCCA), which comes unde ...

cricket from 1978 to 1982 (with the exception of 1980), making 38 Minor Counties Championship appearances, as well as a single List A appearance in the

1982 NatWest Trophy The 1982 NatWest Trophy was an English limited overs county cricket tournament which was held between 3 July and 4 September 1982. It was the 2nd NatWest Trophy, after it had been renamed from the Gillette Cup the previous year. The tournament ...

against

Somerset ( en, All The People of Somerset) , locator_map = , coordinates = , region = South West England , established_date = Ancient , established_by = , preceded_by = , origin = , lord_lieutenant_office =Lord Lieutenant of Somerset , lor ...

Sinhalese Sports Club

By 1983, Sri Lanka had

Test status Test cricket is a form of first-class cricket played at international level between teams representing full member countries of the International Cricket Council (ICC). A match consists of four innings (two per team) and is scheduled to last fo ...

, but Abeynaike never gained full international honours. He played for the Sri Lanka Board President's XI in 1983 against the touring

Australians Australians, colloquially known as Aussies, are the citizens Citizenship is a "relationship between an individual and a state to which the individual owes allegiance and in turn is entitled to its protection". Each state determines the con ...

, he later joined the

Sinhalese Sports Club The Singhalese Sports Club (SSC) is a first-class cricket club in Sri Lanka. Singhalese is the most successful club in Sri Lankan domestic cricket, having won the Premier Trophy a record 32 times to 2017. Although the name is correctly spelt w ...

, who he made his debut for in a List A match in the final of the 1988/89 Brown's Trophy against the

Nondescripts Cricket Club Nondescripts Cricket Club (also known by its initials NCC) is a first-class cricket team based in Colombo, Sri Lanka. The team plays at the Nondescripts Cricket Club Ground. History The club was founded in 1888. The name "Nondescripts" is derived ...

. He made a further List A appearance the following season, in a repeat of the previous seasons final. The Sinhalese Sports Club won both matches. In the 1989/90 season, Abeynaike made eight first-class appearances for the club, the last of which came against the Cambrians Sports Club.

Career statistics

In his first-class career, he played fourteen matches, scoring 412 runs at an

average In ordinary language, an average is a single number taken as representative of a list of numbers, usually the sum of the numbers divided by how many numbers are in the list (the arithmetic mean). For example, the average of the numbers 2, 3, 4, 7, ...

of 24.23, with a high score of 66. With the ball, he took 9 wickets at a

bowling average In cricket, a player's bowling average is the number of runs they have conceded per wicket taken. The lower the bowling average is, the better the bowler is performing. It is one of a number of statistics used to compare bowlers, commonly use ...

of 40.00, with best figures of 6/131. In List A cricket, he scored 136 runs at an average of 136.00 (this inflated average was down to three

not out In cricket, a batter is not out if they come out to bat in an innings and have not been dismissed by the end of an innings. The batter is also ''not out'' while their innings is still in progress. Occurrence At least one batter is not out at t ...

s in his four innings), with a high score of 46 not out. With the ball, he took 2 wickets at an average of 57.50, with best figures of 2/21.

Later life and death

Abeynaike acted as an international commentator on cricket for

United Arab Emirates The United Arab Emirates (UAE; ar, اَلْإِمَارَات الْعَرَبِيَة الْمُتَحِدَة ), or simply the Emirates ( ar, الِْإمَارَات ), is a country in Western Asia ( The Middle East). It is located at ...

based sports broadcaster

TEN Sports Sony Sports Network, formerly Sony Pictures Sports Network, and also known as Sony TEN, is a group of Indian pay television sports channels owned by Culver Max Entertainment (formerly Sony Pictures Networks India). The original TEN Sports cha ...

from 2004 onwards. He died at a hospital in

Colombo Colombo ( ; si, කොළඹ, translit=Koḷam̆ba, ; ta, கொழும்பு, translit=Koḻumpu, ) is the executive and judicial capital and largest city of Sri Lanka by population. According to the Brookings Institution, Colombo me ...

on 21 February 2012, following a heart attack.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Abeynaike, Ranil 1955 births 2012 deaths People from Dehiwala-Mount Lavinia Sri Lankan cricketers Bedfordshire cricketers Sinhalese Sports Club cricketers Sri Lankan cricket commentators