Russell Arnold
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

Russel Premakumaran Arnold (; born 25 October 1973), or Russel Arnold, is a former 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 ...
er of
Tamil Tamil may refer to: People, culture and language * Tamils, an ethno-linguistic group native to India, Sri Lanka, and some other parts of Asia **Sri Lankan Tamils, Tamil people native to Sri Lanka ** Myanmar or Burmese Tamils, Tamil people of Ind ...
descent, who played all forms of the game. He played as the finisher role in the Sri Lankan team batting down the order at international level. Arnold currently works as an international commentator. He was the first
Twenty20 International Twenty20 International (T20I) is a form of Twenty20 cricket, in which each team plays a single innings with a maximum of twenty overs. The matches are played between international teams recognized by the International Cricket Council (ICC). ...
cap for Sri Lanka as he was part of Sri Lanka's first ever T20I team. He retired from cricket in 2007 after playing the final in 2007 ICC Cricket World Cup.


Early life

Arnold was encouraged to take the sport of cricket by his grandfather. He played school cricket at the St. Peter's College, Colombo where he received his primary and secondary education. He played for Sri Lanka Under19 cricket team and impressed in the tour of England in a 3 match test series in 1992 where he scored 242 runs at the average of 48.40. He first arrived to domestic cricket in 1993 at the age of 20.


International career

Arnold made his
Test Test(s), testing, or TEST may refer to: * Test (assessment), an educational assessment intended to measure the respondents' knowledge or other abilities Arts and entertainment * ''Test'' (2013 film), an American film * ''Test'' (2014 film) ...
debut against
Pakistan Pakistan, officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by population, fifth-most populous country, with a population of over 241.5 million, having the Islam by country# ...
on April and his
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 ...
debut 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 ...
later in the year on 6 November 1997. His test debut came as a blessing in disguise as he came as an injury replacement to
Roshan Mahanama Deshabandu Roshan Siriwardene Mahanama (, ; born 31 May 1966) is a former Sri Lankan cricketer and a former ICC match referee. He was a key member for 1996 Cricket World Cup winning team for Sri Lanka. He is the first man to have stood as a ma ...
who was injured in a batting session in the nets. He was initially called into the Sri Lankan reserve squad for the home series against Pakistan in 1997 following his performances in domestic circuit. Originally an opening batsman, Arnold has since moved down the batting order mainly due to the rise of
Marvan Atapattu Deshabandu Marvan Samson Atapattu (, , born 22 November 1970) is a Sri Lankan cricket coach, commentator and former professional cricketer. He played international cricket for the Sri Lankan cricket team from 1990 to 2007. A top-order batsman, ...
. He is most famous in the pearl island as a very versatile player, making him ideally suitable for the limited over version of the game. However, when he started his career, he was seen primarily as a solid top order batsmen where he impressed against Australia during the AIWA Cup of 1999, as well as the subsequent test series against them, where he batted at no 3. He batted at no 6 for the first time in his career during the Coca-Cola Champions Trophy 1999. The then Sri Lankan team head coach
Dav Whatmore Davenell Frederick Whatmore (born 16 March 1954) is a Sri Lanka born Australian cricket coach and former cricketer. A right-handed batsman, Whatmore played seven Test cricket, Test matches for Australia national cricket team, Australia in 1979, ...
had felt that Russel could be utilised well when he plays down the order. In an ODI match against Zimbabwe in 1999, Arnold along with
Sajeewa de Silva Karunakalage Sajeewa Chanaka de Silva (born 11 January 1971) is a former Sri Lankan cricketer. A left-arm fast-medium bowler, he played eight Test matches and 38 One Day Internationals for Sri Lanka between 1996 and 2000. He made his Twenty20 ...
set the record for the highest 10th wicket stand for Sri Lanka in ODI history (51). During the final of the
2000–01 Sharjah Champions Trophy The 2000–2001 Coca-Cola Champions Trophy was a triangular ODI cricket competition held in Sharjah (emirate), Sharjah, United Arab Emirates from 20 to 29 October 2000. It featured the national cricket teams of India national cricket team, India, ...
against India in 2000 at
Sharjah Sharjah (; ', Gulf Arabic: ''aš-Šārja'') is the List of cities in the United Arab Emirates, third-most populous city in the United Arab Emirates, after Dubai and Abu Dhabi. It is the capital of the Emirate of Sharjah and forms part of the D ...
, Arnold helped
Sanath Jayasuriya Deshabandu Sanath Teran Jayasuriya (, ; born 30 June 1969), is a former Sri Lankan cricketer, captain, cricket administrator and coach. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest all rounders ever to play in ODI cricket. A left arm orthodox sp ...
to post his highest individual score of 189. Sanath and Arnold had a good partnership until Sanath stumped after a brilliant 189. Russel provided good support scoring unbeaten 52 off 62 balls in the match. Sri Lanka eventually won the final by a big margin of 245 runs. He was part of the Sri Lankan team captained by Sanath Jayasuriya which won the
2002 ICC Champions Trophy The 2002 ICC Champions Trophy was a cricket tournament held in Sri Lanka in 2002. It marked the third edition of the ICC Champions Trophy, with the previous two tournaments being known as the ICC Knock Out Tournaments. Originally scheduled to be ...
jointly with India. Arnold's failure in the
2003 Cricket World Cup The 2003 ICC Cricket World Cup was the eighth Cricket World Cup, organised by the International Cricket Council (ICC). It was co-hosted by South Africa, Zimbabwe and Kenya from 9 February to 23 March 2003. This edition of the World Cup was the ...
saw him sidelined for many months as selectors opted to groom the youngsters into the side. However, he fought his way back into the side with a string of good scores in domestic cricket for his club, Nondescripts. A calm and cool player in a crisis situation, Arnold has dragged Sri Lanka out of many sticky situations. He is highly valued for his gritty qualities and is considered an unselfish team man. He is considered an ideal No. 6; he is a Methodist Christian of
Tamil Tamil may refer to: People, culture and language * Tamils, an ethno-linguistic group native to India, Sri Lanka, and some other parts of Asia **Sri Lankan Tamils, Tamil people native to Sri Lanka ** Myanmar or Burmese Tamils, Tamil people of Ind ...
descent. Arnold has been nicknamed "Rusty" by
Roshan Mahanama Deshabandu Roshan Siriwardene Mahanama (, ; born 31 May 1966) is a former Sri Lankan cricketer and a former ICC match referee. He was a key member for 1996 Cricket World Cup winning team for Sri Lanka. He is the first man to have stood as a ma ...
and
Pramodya Wickramasinghe Wickramasinghe Gallage Pramodya (born August 14, 1971), commonly known as Pramodya Wickramasinghe, is a former Sri Lankan cricketer. He was a right-handed batsman and a right-arm-fast bowler. He was a member of 1996 Cricket World Cup winning tea ...
, due to it being a very common nickname for the name Russel, and for his batting style as tough and durable, though not really pretty. His late cut shot is admired by many critics at that time where he used the shot so often to spin bowling. Arnold made his T20I debut against England on 15 June 2006, which was incidentally Sri Lanka's first-ever T20I match. It was also his only T20I match in his career and Sri Lanka won the match by two runs.


Retirement

During April 2007 he announced, through team manager
Michael Tissera Michael Hugh Tissera (born 23 March 1939) is a former Sri Lankan cricketer who played in the 1975 Cricket World Cup. School Tissera was born at Colombo and educated at S. Thomas' College, Mount Lavinia, where, initially appearing in 1954 aged fo ...
, that he intended to retire from international cricket after the 2007 ICC Cricket World Cup final, which came as a shock to Sri Lankan cricket. He cited the pressure of too much travel as his reason. After retirement, he played A-grade cricket in Sydney for Hornsby District Cricket Club and has also played numerous games for the Melbourne Super Kings in Melbourne. He also played for Chennai Superstars in the
Indian Cricket League The Indian Cricket League (ICL) was a short-lived cricket league that ran from 2007 to 2009. It was sponsored by Zee Entertainment Enterprises, a media company. The ICL had two seasons, featuring four international teams and nine domestic teams ...
. He also coached at Barker College, a prestigious private school in Sydney's north. He also was assistant coach to
Deccan Chargers Deccan Chargers (also sometimes known as the Chargers) is a defunct cricket franchise that competed in the Indian Premier League. It was based in the city of Hyderabad. The franchise was one of the eight inaugural members of the IPL in 2008 and ...
in the IPL before the team was removed from the competition. In 2018, he was appointed as the tournament director of the
Lanka Premier League The Lanka Premier League (abbreviated as LPL; , ) is a professional franchise cricket league established in 2020 in Sri Lanka. Matches are played using the Twenty20 cricket format by five teams named after Sri Lankan cities. The league was int ...
by the
Sri Lanka Cricket Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) is the governing body for cricket in Sri Lanka. It was first registered with the Sri Lankan Ministry of Sports (Sri Lanka), Ministry of Sports as the Board of Control for Cricket in Sri Lanka on 30 June 1975 as a national ...
but the proposed 2018 edition of the LPL was cancelled due to the dissolution of the Sri Lanka Cricket Board. He also played for Sri Lanka Legends in
2020-21 Road Safety World Series The symbol , known in Unicode as hyphen-minus, is the form of hyphen most commonly used in digital documents. On most keyboards, it is the only character that resembles a minus sign or a dash, so it is also used for these. The name ''hyphen-min ...
which was captained by
Tillakaratne Dilshan Tillakaratne Mudiyanselage Dilshan (; born 14 October 1976), commonly known as TM Dilshan () is a former Sri Lankan cricketer and former captain of the Sri Lanka national cricket team. He is often regarded as the best rated Sri Lankan player i ...
and Sri Lanka Legends became runners up to India Legends in the final.


Current career

Arnold is now a popular television commentator and also writes a weekly Q+A column on Island Cricket. Russel also keeps his fans entertained using his iPhone ap
'Ask Rusty'
launched in 2012. It was launched in 2012 along with the T20 World Cup. The iPhone app allows Russel's fans to ask questions directly from Russel Arnold. In addition, it consists of feeds of Russel's match predictions where the user can actively participate in voting. He also wrote articles for
ESPNcricinfo ESPNcricinfo (formerly known as Cricinfo or CricInfo) is a sports news website exclusively for the game of cricket. The site features news, articles, live coverage of cricket matches (including liveblogs and scorecards), and ''StatsGuru'', a ...
for brief stint. He also worked as a radio broadcaster for a short period of time. On 1 December 2016, Arnold won the Dialog
Sri Lanka Cricket Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) is the governing body for cricket in Sri Lanka. It was first registered with the Sri Lankan Ministry of Sports (Sri Lanka), Ministry of Sports as the Board of Control for Cricket in Sri Lanka on 30 June 1975 as a national ...
awards for the International Commentator of the year 2015. He is currently regarded as just one of two Sri Lankan international cricket commentators alongside Roshan Abeysinghe. He has worked as a commentator in international cricket matches involving Sri Lanka as well as worked as commentator in
Test Match Special ''Test Match Special'' (also known as ''TMS'') is a British sports radio programme, originally, as its name implies, dealing exclusively with Test cricket matches, but currently covering any professional cricket. The programme is available on BB ...
,
Indian Premier League The Indian Premier League (IPL) is a professional Twenty20 (T20) cricket league in India, organised by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI). Founded in 2007, it features ten city-based Professional sports league organization, fr ...
,
2020 Lanka Premier League The 2020 Lanka Premier League also known as My11Circle LPL T20, for sponsorship reasons, was the inaugural edition of the Lanka Premier League (LPL) Twenty20 franchise cricket tournament in Sri Lanka. Five teams based on various Sri Lankan citi ...
. He has also engaged in giving commentary in Tamil during a pre match analysis prior to the start of a test match between India and Sri Lanka in 2017 and in the
2020 Indian Premier League The 2020 Indian Premier League (also known as IPL 13 and branded as Dream11 Indian Premier League 2020) was the thirteenth season of the Indian Premier League, a professional Twenty20 cricket (T20) league established by the Board of Control for ...
for Star Sports Tamil. Following the success of Russel's comic strip "Chilling with Russel" during the Road Safety World Series, he launched his YouTube Channel Talk show alongside friend and Manager Shyam Impett titled "Chilling With Russel" in July 2021. In August 2021, he was appointed as the mentor of the Northern Rangers
PUBG Mobile ''PUBG Mobile'' is a free-to-play battle royale video game co-developed by LightSpeed Studios, LightSpeed & Quantum Studio and PUBG Studios. It is a mobile game adaptation of ''PUBG: Battlegrounds''. It was initially released for Android (opera ...
team for the Gamer.LK's Singer Esports Premier League.


Controversies

During the final of the 2002 ICC Champions Trophy which was held in Sri Lanka, Indian skipper
Sourav Ganguly Sourav Chandidas Ganguly (; natively spelled as Gangopadhyay; born 8 July 1972), also known as Dada (meaning ''"elder brother"'' in Bengali language, Bengali), is an Indian cricket commentator and former cricketer. He is popularly called the ...
became frustrated with Arnold who was seen stepping onto the main danger area of the pitch while batting and Ganguly gave him warning to avoid stepping into the danger area of the pitch. He along with four Sri Lankan players were banned by Sri Lanka Cricket from taking part in domestic cricket competitions in Sri Lanka after taking part in the unofficial Indian Cricket League in 2007. Russel was alleged that he retired from international cricket in order to play in the Indian Cricket League but he rubbished the claims. A year later in 2008, Sri Lanka Cricket lifted the ban imposed on all five players and they were allowed to return to Sri Lankan domestic cricket circuit.


References


External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Arnold, Russel Sri Lankan cricketers 1973 births Living people Sri Lanka Test cricketers Sri Lanka One Day International cricketers Cricketers at the 2003 Cricket World Cup Cricketers at the 2007 Cricket World Cup Sri Lankan Methodists Sri Lanka Twenty20 International cricketers 21st-century Sri Lankan sportsmen Nondescripts Cricket Club cricketers Cricketers at the 1998 Commonwealth Games Sri Lankan Tamil people Chennai Superstars cricketers ICL World XI cricketers Alumni of St. Peter's College, Colombo Sri Lankan cricket commentators Commonwealth Games competitors for Sri Lanka