EXCLUSIVE: The champion CCC Skipper Ashan Priyanjan was over the moon over his club winning the Sri Lanka Cricket Major League Tournament for a record third consecutive year. And he had every reason to be in the champagne mood having skippered CCC in all three championship triumphs. In an exclusive interview with Sri Lanka Cricket website, the 33-year old former Nalanda College product, who led from the front by striking a timely century in the final versus Tamil Union C&AC last week-end, said, “It is an honour to have been around to captaining CCC to all three titles in that record unique feat.” He went on to identify the team unity as one family to have been the pay off attribute to going the ultimate distance of such a trophy conquest. “In our team all players are treated equally. There is no such thing called seniority at CCC when it comes to player recognition. This outlook has been a gelling factor to our success where all are in a comfortable zone when it comes to raising their hands,” he said.
He added that that family bonding among the club was such that for the final star player Wanindu Hasaranga de Silva was right there ‘with us along with Asitha Fernando back from world cup duty to show their solidarity.’ As to his 219-run turn around partnership with Chamindu Wijesinghe, he said, “We put our heads down and buckled down to the task. The pitch was playing easy and we were able to play our shots. I must say that Chamindu has been a great all-round find. He is one of our young player’s in the 20 age group along with Sonal Dinusha, Pawan Rathnayake, Nimesha Gunasinghe and Lasith Abeyrathne.” He also praised the efforts of Kamindu Mendis, Minod Bhanuka, Lakshan Sandakan and Malinda Pushpakumara The victorious skipper made the point that CCC had developed in a strong arm of experience over the years that this year’s winning team had six players from the outfit that did duty ‘when we first won the title two years ago. Priyanjan, who has represented Sri Lanka in 23 ODIs, said that this year’s success was built around 5 outright wins and an equal number of first innings wins with two rained off. Priyanjan, is proud to be the Sri Lankan batsman with the record for the highest score on debut of 74 versus Pakistan in 2013. He regards Mahela Jayawardene from his old school to be his favourite great. He made special mention of CCC Head Coach Tharanga Dhammika and Assistant Coach Roshantha Silva. “They have been the team’s guiding light.” He went on to thank the club Chairman and Sri Lanka Cricket President, Shammi Silva for the great support.