By Revatha Silva
Ashen Silva beat former champion and prominent Davis Cup player Sharmal Dissanayake in the final to clinch his first Sri Lanka tennis men’s singles title recently at the Sri Lanka Tennis Association (SLTA) clay courts in Colombo.
Silva started tennis in 2010 at St. Peter’s College, Negombo by playing in the green ball category for Under 10 players. He was then coached by Joy Bardent.
In 2012, he travelled with the Sri Lanka team to Vietnam to play the International Tennis Federation (ITF) 14 and Under Zone 2 event, the first national representation a boy could get in Sri Lanka’s tennis until now.
Silva joined St. Peter’s College, Colombo in 2014 and came under the tutelage of Dinith Pathiraja, a renowned coach and coach of many national players including Dineshkanthan Thangarajah and Nishangan Nadaraja. Pathiraja has been the Head Coach of St. Peter’s since the very inception of tennis at the prestigious college.
Silva also toured with the junior Sri Lanka team to Malaysia in 2014 and also to Qatar the same year. He was in Thailand for an Asian Tennis Federation (ATF) training programme in 2016.
In 2017, he was part of the Sri Lanka team to tour India for the Junior Davis Cup staged for under 16 boys.
By then, Silva had won the Junior National (Under 18) Sri Lanka titles in 2012, 2013, 2014, and 2015.
Silva gave up playing tennis in 2018 for personal reasons, yet coach Pathiraja got him back on the court last year with some persuasion, following which Silva began working with Pathiraja in his academy again.
The results were more than amazing: Ashen Silva got selected to the Sri Lanka Davis Cup team this year and became Sri Lanka Men’s National Champion weeks later.
Ashen Silva, the newest SL national tennis champion
23 Oct 2022
Ashen Silva, the newest SL national tennis champion
23 Oct 2022