Birthday special: Marvan Atapattu – the inspirational opening batsman from Sri Lanka
The former Sri Lankan skipper Marvan Atapattu was one of the most technically sound batsmen of his era. He went on to become one of the mainstays of Sri Lanka’s batting line-up in both Tests and One Day Internationals. Along with being an elegant batsman, Atapattu was also a skilful fielder and possessed an accurate throw.
Marvan was born in Kalutara, Sri Lanka on November 22, 1970. He started his journey in cricket as a teenager at Mahinda College in Galle, however, later moved over to Ananda College in Colombo. The opening batsman made his first-class debut in 1988-89 and has some astonishing domestic figures under his belt.
Over the years, Atapattu collected 14,491 runs in 228 First-class games at an average of 48.8 along with 10,802 runs in 329 List A games at an average of 39.6. The exploits in the domestic circuit earned Marvan Atapattu a place in the Sri Lankan cricket team. He made his debut at the age of 20 against India at Chandigarh in November 1990.
Rickety start
However, Atapattu had a nightmarish start to his international career. Sri Lanka lost the match by an innings and 8 runs. Worse, Atapattu scored 0 in both innings. After getting a pair on Test debut, Marvan was dropped from the team and made an unsuccessful comeback after 21 months.
In his comeback match, he scored a duck and 1 run and the selectors again had to drop him from the team. Interestingly, it is believed that the 1 run that Marvan scored was wrongly attributed to him as it was a leg-bye.
After getting dropped, Atapattu returned back to the domestic circuit and scored a plethora of runs. This again impressed the selectors and he was back in the team. Surprisingly, he scored a duck in both innings. At that time, his career stats read 1 run and 5 ducks in his first 6 innings. Thus, there was a big question mark on the future of this technically sound opening batter.
His ODI debut was no better as on the tour to India, he was sent to bat at Number 9 and scored 8*. He was in and out of the side before establishing himself as a regular member of the ODI side in 1996.
The classy right-hander again made a comeback in the Test team in 1997. He was added in the team for a match against New Zealand in Dunedin. His scores in both innings were 25 and 22. Though the figures were not extraordinary, he got the much-needed start.
A strong comeback
Marvan Atapattu’s career started accelerating after he scored his maiden Test century against India in Mohali where he scored 108 with 14 fours as an opener in 1997. The knock helped his team post a total of 369 in this match which ended in a draw. After this, there was no looking back for the prolific batsman as he went on to register himself as the fourth batsman to achieve the feat of scoring six double-hundreds in the longest format of the game, a feat bettered only by Sir Donald Bradman (12), Wally Hammond and Brian Lara (7 each).
His highest Test score is 249 against Zimbabwe in Bulawayo. He also scored 11 ODI hundreds, with 132* against England in the final of the 1998 Emirates Triangular Tournament being his highest score.
The veteran finished his career with 5502 runs in 90 Test matches at an average of 39.02. His 268 ODIs produced 8529 runs at an average of 37.57.
