Great sportspersons have amazing life stories and Hasitha Chanaka, a top level badminton player in the country has his own.
Although it’s in badminton that Chanaka has made a name for himself he has many facets to his life.
It was he who created the five rupee coin and the thousand rupee note that were published in 2007 after Sri Lanka’s cricket team emerged runners-up of the 2007 World Cup in the Caribbean.
Furthermore, he also opened batting with Upul Tharanga for the Darmasoka College cricket team and went onto captain the future Sri Lankan Test opener.
Often sports prevents athletes from pursuing their studies successfully, but not Chanaka. He got through his Advanced Level Examination with flying colours that too in Science stream and qualified for Sri Jayewardenepura University.
But he gave up that to pursue his interests in badminton and joined Sampath Bank, without whose support he says that excellence in the sport wouldn’t have been possible.
Teaming up with Rajitha Dahanayake, Chanaka came up with some stunning performances in the recently concluded National Badminton Championship.
The pair defeated the two brothers Diluka and Dinuka Karunaratne, who have lots of experience having won several national titles. Incidentally, the two brothers were declared the champion and the runner-up respectively in the singles event.
Chanaka who has represented Sri Lanka on several overseas tournaments is yet to win an international medal, but at the age of 25, there’s no doubt in his mind that he will be able to win a medal soon.
The highlight of his career was helping Sri Lanka to attain a higher international rank after taking part in Sudirman Cup in China last year under the captaincy of Thilini Jayasinghe where the team secured the 31st position recovering from number 36.
Chanaka said that his next aim is to enable the country win a medal in an international event.
"I am disappointed about certain things that I did in my life. But you can’t change the past. At the end of the day, I am happy with what I have achieved now," Chanaka said in an interview recently.
"I must thank the management of the Sampath Bank and the Marketing Division of the bank for helping me out to reach this level. Without their help, I wouldn’t have been able to come this far."
"I must thank my coaches as well namely Nishanthi Withanage, Kamani Silva, Danesh Mallayawadu, Sanjaya Sumanasiri, Pradeep Welagedara and Mothilal Jayathilake". Concluded Chanaka(www.island.lk)
No comments:
Post a Comment