Note: this article was written prior to the Sri Lanka tour being called off
Politics is a delicate topic in Sri Lanka. For all we may feel that Brexit has polarised British politics into two camps that will hurl rocks at each other unceasingly, the long-running ethnic and religious divide in Sri Lanka has been on an entirely different level. Its impact has trickled into cricket which can be read as a barometer of peacefulness on the island.
Sri Lanka were awarded Test status in 1981 and hosted their first match against England at the P Saravanamuttu Stadium, Colombo in 1982. Frequent-flyer England supporters will remember the ground from England’s 2012 tour and the daily struggle to be delivered to the P Sara not the Pizza Hut. The P Sara hosts the Tamil Sports Club and was conspicuously denied Test cricket during 1983-84 coinciding with what Tamil groups describe as the ‘First Eelam War’.
Following a truce between the government and rebels both India and Pakistan played at the P Sara in 1985 and ’86. India, the brokers of the peace deal, also played at the Singhalese Cricket Ground (SSC – the cricket ground of the Singhalese Sports Club) in Colombo, ten minutes down the road. Heart of the establishment, three of the SSC’s presidents have held the same rank (OK, pedants: President or PM) in national politics. Clearly it made political sense for India to play at the ground linked by its founding history to each side in this conflict as it sought to negotiate a lasting peace.
This truce did not hold, with Tamil rebels beginning three years of heavy fighting and taking control of the northern city of Jaffna. I hear there are plans afoot to build a new international cricket stadium here, presumably with the intention of forging a longer-lasting sense of security. From 1986-1993 home Tests were played at the SSC, Asgiriya and Tyronne Fernando stadiums (now De Soysa Park, just south of Mount Lavinia). From 1982-2001 the P Sara hosted 6 Tests; the SSC hosted 21. The Asgiriya, of course, is the beautiful ground at Trinity College, Kandy, which I visited in 2012 and found in a sad state of disrepair. It was replaced in Sri Lanka Cricket’s eyes by the Pallekele stadium, of which more later. The 1993 Test return to P Sara came against India; the Tamil people have a long history in the south of India, specifically in Tamil Nadu state, the capital of which is Chennai (once Madras) and India’s protective watch over Sri Lankan Tamils has added another angle to this long-running conflict. As recently as 2013 Tamil Nadu state refused to host IPL games involving Sri Lankan players and officials in protest against Sri Lanka’s treatment of its Tamil minority.
In 1991 the LTTE (‘Tamil Tigers’) were held responsible for the assassinations of former Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Ghandi and Sri Lankan President Ranasinghe Premadasa and if the name wasn’t familiar before, it should be now as the second Test this series is being played at the Colombo ground renamed in his honour. Or at least it was meant to be. At time of writing most news sites seem unclear about whether the match will now relocate to the SSC. The Premadasa is the floodlit but concrete bowl of a stadium, hardly as appealing as any of the old grounds and one Sri Lankan update in October 2019 suggested a possible switch to the SSC because of urgent and extensive renovations to the stadium which is clearly made for limited overs cricket. Premadasa built this stadium in his relatively lowly home neighbourhood while in power and if you do amble by it, you’ll see the wandering cattle and tuk tuk repair shops all around.
From 1994-2002 the civil war raged on in violent bloodshed and many ‘disappearances’. In January of this year President Gotabaya Rajapaksa (brother of Prime Minister, Mahinda Rajapaksa) acknowledged that tens of thousands of missing people are in fact dead, and announced plans to issue death certificates so that assets and inheritances can be accessed by surviving relatives. Unsurprisingly, no international Tests were played at the P Sara between 1994-2002. England’s 1993 and 2001 tours took place while war raged in the north and east of Sri Lanka and by 2007 the government, led by the Rajapaksa brothers, was launching its decisive military offensive. UK residents may remember Channel 4 News coverage from the time and if they don’t, can check it out when you get back. By the time of the 2012 tour it was considered safe for tourists to travel in the north and east and some decided to do so, even more in 2018 in stunningly beautiful city and coastal areas. For many Sinhala people, especially those in their home region in the south of the island, the Rajapaksa brothers were heroes for forcing the end of the war.
Sri Lanka hosted the 2011 Cricket World Cup and 2012 World Twenty20 – a huge boost for its post-war economy and hopes for a peaceful democratic future – and the government was prepared to spend big to make it a success. As part of a wider plan to turn Hambantota (the Rajapaksas’ home district in the south) into Sri Lanka’s second city and an economic powerhouse, a new international stadium was built: The Mahinda Rajapaksa International Cricket Stadium. It joined brand new highways, an international conference centre and airport, and the Sri Lanka-China Industrial Zone which is essentially a free trade area for China within Sri Lankan territory close to a port which has been handed back into Chinese control due to difficulty keeping up its loan repayments. Hambantota stadium now sits empty but for the locals’ grain and grasses drying in the sun for human consumption and animal fodder. We drove past in 2018 on our way from Ella to Talalla and were shocked by its haunting presence.
In 2014 Ranil Wickremesinghe was elected, in part on a mandate to cease such deals with China. Internationally it was felt that Sri Lanka was moving on peacefully and the P Sara ground again hosted regular Test cricket. Perhaps the Pallekele Stadium fared better than Hambantota because of its proximity to Kandy, although the supporting infrastructure is patently inadequate as revealed in 2018 when a host of England supporters were turfed out of their hotel because there wasn’t room for both teams and them; most of Kandy’s charm is in its diminutive size, after all. Oh, the Kandy Muslim Hotel. If you’re up that way then you really must visit. Kottu roti. You can thank me later. On that same tour the first warm-up match was played at Nondescripts Cricket Club, Colombo. This colonial club was founded on the principles of racial, caste and religious equality and it certainly felt like a fresher, safer, more optimistic era than on my last visit in 2012.
Since then, the 2019 Easter terrorist attacks in Catholic churches have created a stifling atmosphere of hostility towards Sri Lanka’s Muslims. PC TinTin and I had noticed an increase in anti-Islamic sentiment among Sri Lankans that we chatted with in 2018 and the Easter attacks have, sadly, only exacerbated that feeling. While we feasted in Talalla on the south coast last trip, the TV switched to breaking news of celebrating locals. In a moment of constitutional crisis, Mahinda Rajapaksa declared himself the new Prime Minister, ousting Wikremesinghe. Sri Lankans in Talalla were jubilant. The young Australians staying in our place declared ‘how sweet it is that you’ve got your prime minister back’. Gotabaya Rajapaksa won the Presidential election of 2019 and just days ago he called early Parliamentary elections with the stated aim of restoring the Presidential powers that were reduced by his predecessor. It may offer some encouragement that our second warm-up will take place at the P Sara, site of a blistering Kevin Pietersen century 8 years ago and a superb England victory. The first will be played at Katunayake, a suburb of Negombo (targeted in the Easter bombings) which is close to the airport and beach, so is most convenient for England fans arriving before the Tests.
We become used to our values of pluralism and tolerance and any England supporter travelling to Sri Lanka hopes for the same from this beautiful, hospitable country. Cricket has the capacity to unite its citizens. Wishing you all, supporters of England or Sri Lanka, a safe and happy time this tour.
Tractor