When Walter Cammack came down the gangway at Colombo Port, little did he know that he was going to set alight a deep passion for basketball in this small island. He was assigned to the Central YMCA as the Director of Physical Education. As an American who had played the game, he set about introducing the world’s second fastest game to the islanders through the YMCA system in 1917 and to schools, starting with Ananda College in 1927.
Cammack left, but his mission continued, and the mid-’50s saw the Moratuwa YMCA introducing basketball as a ‘spend your evening’ sport for the community on a ‘guru’ (clay) patch in the front yard. By this time, basketball was already being played at St. Sebastian’s College, coached by the legendary Anthony Joachim Daniels (AJ), also on a ‘guru’ court, rolled every day by its groundsman, the lovable Mahathung Maama.
In the early ’60s, Moratuwa ‘Y’ brought in the steam rollers and laid a tar court. There was no fancy peanut butter bitumen top layer, but a plain base layer of tar and a spread of tiny ‘kalu gal’ pieces on top which felt like purgatory for outsiders even with their shoes on, but it was heaven for barefooted, hard-soled Y players.
After every practice, we had to remove the prickly stones stuck in our roughed-up soles using pins. We did not count scrapes and bruises from diving on this court as injuries, except when Granville de Silva had broken a little toe, playing barefoot.
While Moratuwa’s first club basketball team, Bastians, was formed with St. Sebastian’s College players in early ’60s, the first Moratuwa Y team was formed in 1965, also of the players from the ‘College’ (as it was known in Moratuwa). They competed for the inaugural All Ceylon Inter YMCA Championship known as Cammack Cup, organised by the Central YMCA.
This team, which won the tournament beating the Colombo YMCA, comprised legends of Moratuwa – basketball brothers Elmo and Duncan Jayawardena, team Captain late Kenneth Fonseka, late Vincent Fernando who became a renowned coach in the Kandy District and his brother late Laksiri Fernando, late Ian Barthelot, and Parakrama Fernando, who played barefooted basketball most of his life and is undoubtedly the best low post or base player Sri Lanka has seen. I used to pick up his shots as a junior and enjoyed and learnt from seeing him up close, practising for hours.
Like the mighty Mississippi or our own Bolgoda, Moratuwa steadily rolled her river of basketball to dominance from the ’60s to the ’80s through YMCA and the College. AJ Daniels not only coached basketball players, but he also created coaches. His protege Elmo Jayawardena took over the reins of Moratuwa basketball as a young coach with a great vision.
The YMCA and the College complemented each other with similar programmes, including youth development. Junior players graduated through extensive coaching clinics at both ends to become better players whilst the seniors moved to play for the YMCA. Of these, Royce Fernando, who played in one of the champion teams, was certified as an ‘A’ grade referee, adding another feather to the YMCA setup.
The College court had been upgraded to a fully layered tar court by the early ’60s, yet the Y court stayed the same with its pineapple skin top. However, by the early ’70s they had installed flood lights and this provided continuous basketball from 3 p.m. to 9 p.m.
The players from the College always ran to the Y to join practices as Patrick aiya of the College and Joseph, the sacristan of St. Joseph’s Church, started their bell-ringing match at 6.30 p.m. The players who came to the YMCA graduated by first keeping scores before being promoted to paddle in senior players, then broke through to the bench of 12.
Jefferey Bandara, who came to the Y with a carrom disc in his pocket, became an accurate wing shooter of the ’70s champions team. Ranil de Silva (named Fricky after the local motorcycle racing champ), who led the paddlers squadron and at times deliberately did not pick up players on the pushbike so that he could steal some game time, later became an ace shooter with a perfect elbow and a wrist break. They were all part of the Y team.
The floodlit court welcomed other Moratuwa schools too. Granville de Silva (Prince of Wales) came to play carrom, but played for Sri Lanka after a punishing training schedule. Asha Cooray was recognised as the best centre player Sri Lanka had seen, even compared to men, and became one of Asia’s gold class players. Both of them, without their school courts, bore an excellent testimony to the YMCA programme.
Granville was Moratuwa’s only men’s double international, having played in the 1983 Cricket World Cup, and Asha became a basketball and netball international at the record-breaking age of 14.
Coincidentally, both the first YMCA women’s team and the OLV Convent team were formed in 1972 after a two-day training camp for girls in which all Moratuwa girls’ schools participated. The camp was head coached by Rex Perera and helped by late Vincent Fernando.
Y court became the home court for OLV Convent until they had their court built in the ’90s. The first YMCA girls’ team comprised Asha Cooray and Charmaine Caldera (who were the first to play representative basketball for the Western Province), Sunilka Fernando, late Dayanka Fernando, Nalika Fernando, Ronita de Mel (all from OLV Convent and
represented Sri Lanka) in a long list of players. Indrani Mendis and Deepthi de Silva (De Jong) were from other schools.
The year 1975 saw Duncan Jayawardena, the dashing play-maker, being appointed Captain of the Sri Lanka national team against the visiting Chinese national team. The YMCA had a tradition of handing down the roles to successors. Srikalal Fernando took over play-making duties from Duncan and Priya Cooray took over from Srikalal, and all captained Sri Lanka teams while Asha Cooray and late Dayanka Fernando captained women’s national teams.
The domination of the Moratuwa YMCA brought home championships in major club tournaments such as Exter Shield, Victor Vijayaratnam, Depot Cup, Webber Cup, Joyce Thurairatnam Cup, and various others. In the process, YMCA had produced a lineup of Sri Lankan players other than those who were already mentioned.
Lawrence Fernando, Guwanmini Mendis (lovingly known as Gummi), late Paul Almeida, Samson de Mel (the Simbo), Henry Lalith, Theja, Sriya (‘Auto’ for his natural fake), Anuradha of the Cooray siblings, Christian Kumar the tall centre, and Piyal de Silva from Dharmasoka College, Ambalangoda represented Sri Lanka in national teams. Francis Silva (aiya) of the Air Force and national team repute also joined the Y team.
Some Y players who scored their last layup deserve our respect and special remembrance. Among them are Climarcus Fernando who was a respected coach and right forward, Franklyn Piterz who played inside post, Paul Almeida – an accomplished centre player, Ranjith Illangakoon a.k.a. Dolta who played low post, Ranjith Perera or Kalu Ranjiya who played as a right forward, and Terry Silva alias T. Malli, the latest to go, who was more illustrious in driving fear into many a so-called best dribbler with his defensive skills and an arrowhead fast break run with an accurate two-point line driver.
Players and championship winning teams just do not happen without coaches, and Moratuwa was blessed with the crème de la crème of coaches headed by Elmo and Duncan Jayawardena, Rex Perera, late Vincent Fernando, late Climarcus Fernando, his brother Srikalal, and Charles Perera.
Wiville Silva took over as the custodian coach of OLV Convent and retired after 25 years. The YMCA also had the honour of playing with teams of excellent coaches in the calibre of S. Mahadevan, Rev. Fr. Eugene Herbert, and Messrs Naufer Mahroof and Ram Sundaralingam. The list could go on and they all deserve our applause.
The last of Moratuwa Mohicans, Elmo Jayawardena, who was in the first YMCA and Bastians teams, still runs up and down the College court for a full game at the age of 76, only to stop to teach young kids what it means to give a good pass.
The story of the YMCA also had lots of flag days, sing songs, thousands of string hoppers with ‘mus’ curry and cutlets, panaati catching in the beach on Sundays, swimming in Bolgoda, train trips to Batticaloa, koththu lunch at Pasikuda, etc., most snapped by Rimano’s camera, all of which had helped build a deep sense of camaraderie, but more so, citizens instilled with good human values.
Sadly, our road to basketball glory reached a dead end when the authorities decided to build the new Moratuwa-Galle Road across our revered Y court, the only neutral court in Moratuwa. We continued Y basketball using the College courts, but only for a fleeting time as it did not feel the same.
Adding insult to injury, the YMCA management decided not to build a new court despite all financial and material support offered by former players at the behest of late Darrel Perera (Darrell uncle). It still hurts not knowing the reasons for that. Yet we say, “We were there and we did play great basketball”.