Thilan Thusara Samaraweera is a former Sri Lankan international cricketer. Samaraweera played international cricket for Sri Lanka. Known as Sri Lanka's crisis man and for his slow strike rate, He is also nicknamed “Bullet Samaraweera" following his wounding during the 2009 terror attack on his national team bus in Pakistan. He retired after over 80 matches with a batting average over 48 in Test cricket.
Gaddafi Stadium, previously known as Lahore Stadium is a cricket stadium in Lahore, Punjab, Pakistan, owned by the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB). With a capacity of 27,000, it is the fourth largest cricket stadium of Pakistan. It is the home ground of Lahore Qalandars in the PSL. Gaddafi Stadium was the first in Pakistan to be equipped with modern floodlights having their own standby power generators. The headquarters of the Pakistan Cricket Board are situated at Gaddafi Stadium, thus making it the home of the Pakistan national cricket team.
The Bangladeshi cricket team toured Sri Lanka for three One Day International cricket matches and two Test cricket matches in August and September 2005. The Bangladeshi team was coming off a moderately successful tour of England, as they had pushed Australia close in one ODI and beat them in another. However, they had still lost five out of six matches in the NatWest Series, both of the Test matches, and remained at the bottom of both the ICC Test Championship and ICC ODI Championship. The hosts Sri Lanka, meanwhile, were undefeated in home ODI tournaments since February 2004, and in home Test series since March 2004, both against top-ranked Australia. Their win in the Indian Oil Cup a month before this series saw them into second place in the ODI Championship, but they are only ranked sixth in Tests.
Hewasandatchige Asiri Prasanna Wishvanath Jayawardene, commonly known as Prasanna Jayawardene is a former Sri Lankan cricketer, who played Test and ODIs for Sri Lanka Cricket team. He is a right-handed batsman and a wicketkeeper, where he served as the permanent wicketkeeper in tests.
Warushavithana Upul Tharanga, commonly known as Upul Tharanga, is a former professional Sri Lankan cricketer, and a former limited over captain who played for all formats of the game. He is a left-handed opening batsman and occasional wicket-keeper. On 23 February 2021, Upul announced his retirement from international cricket.
Sri Lanka toured England for cricket matches during the 2006 international cricket season. England were back home for the first time since September and looked to maintain their Test standards, which saw them keep their second place in the ICC Test Championship in India, and the teams were also competing for sixth place in the ICC ODI Championship as both England and Sri Lanka were coming off the back of two lost ODI tours on the Asian sub-continent, against India and Pakistan respectively. To add to problems, both teams were likely to be missing some key members of the team as England were without some of their squad for their previous tour and, two days before Sri Lanka departed for England, it was revealed that skipper Marvan Atapattu would stay at home for the tour due to back problems that had forced him to skip his previous tour too. Jehan Mubarak was brought in as his replacement.
The India cricket team toured Sri Lanka between 18 July and 2 September 2001. The two sides played a triangular ODI series also involving New Zealand, following which they played a three-match Test series. India's tour also included a one-day and a three-day fixture ahead of the ODI and Test series respectively.
The 2008–09 international cricket season was between September 2008 and March 2009. The season saw the security concerns for cricket in Pakistan reach a pinnacle. The ICC Champions Trophy, scheduled to be held in Pakistan in September 2008, was postponed to 2009 after five of the participating nations refused to send their teams for the event. In November 2008, a Pakistani militant group launched terror attacks in Mumbai. This led to India cancelling their tour of Pakistan originally scheduled for January and February 2009. Sri Lanka agreed to tour Pakistan in place of India. However, the tour was jeopardised by a terror attack in Lahore where gunmen fired at a bus carrying the Sri Lankan team, injuring six team members. The Champions Trophy was later relocated to South Africa. No international cricket were played in Pakistan for more than five years. This period of isolation ended when Zimbabwe toured Pakistan in May 2015. After successfully hosting a few T20Is against World-XI, the Sri Lanka cricket team and the West Indians from 2017 to 2018, a few matches of the Pakistan Super League from 2017 to 2019, the whole season in 2020 as well as hosting complete tours against Sri Lankan and Bangladeshi cricket teams respectively during the 2019–20 season, built a good reputation of Pakistan. Hence, by the end of 2019, the Pakistan Cricket Board, announced that they would no longer play any of their future home matches at a neutral venue, indicating that International Cricket has returned to the country on full-time basis.
Nishad Tharanga Paranavitana is a former Sri Lankan Test cricketer. He is an opening batsman and an off-break bowler. He retired from all forms of cricket in August 2020.
The 2009 attack on the Sri Lanka national cricket team occurred on 3 March 2009, when a bus carrying Sri Lankan cricketers, part of a larger convoy, was fired upon by 12 gunmen near Gaddafi Stadium in Lahore, Pakistan. The cricketers were on their way to play the third day of the second Test against the Pakistani cricket team. Six members of the Sri Lanka national cricket team were wounded and six Pakistani policemen and two civilians were killed.
The Pakistan cricket team toured Sri Lanka from June to August 2009. The team played three Test matches, five One Day Internationals, and one Twenty20 International against Sri Lanka. The tour was the return tour of the Sri Lankan cricket team in Pakistan in 2008–09, where during the second test the match was abandoned due to a terrorist attack on the Sri Lankan cricket team which injured seven players, three staff and killed six Pakistani policemen and two civilians.
Narangoda Liyanaarachchige Thisara Chirantha Perera, popularly as Thisara Perera, is a former Sri Lankan international cricketer who played all formats for the national team. He also captained the team in limited-overs formats. Domestically he plays for Sri Lanka Army Sports Club in the Premier Trophy and Premier Limited-Overs Tournament, and the Jaffna Stallions in the Lanka Premier League. Perera has played franchise T20 cricket all around the world for numerous leagues. Primarily a bowling all-rounder, he is an aggressive left-handed batsman who can hit big sixes in death overs and is a useful right-arm medium-fast bowler.
The Pakistani cricket team toured Sri Lanka from 23 February to 27 March 1986. The tour consisted of three Test matches and four One Day Internationals (ODIs). This was Pakistan's first Test series tour in Sri Lanka. The series ended 1–1 with 1 match drawn.
Deshabandu Pinnaduwage Aravinda de Silva is a former Sri Lankan cricketer and captain, who has also played in English county cricket. De Silva was a key member of the Sri Lankan team that won 1996 Cricket World Cup, where he scored a match winning century in the final, that brought Sri Lanka from underdog status to present-day form. He has held various posts in Sri Lankan Cricket after his retirement in 2003.
The Sri Lankan cricket team toured South Africa from 9 December 2011 to 22 January 2012. The tour included three Tests and five One Day Internationals (ODIs) between Sri Lanka and South Africa.
The Pakistan cricket team toured Sri Lanka from 11 June to 1 August 2015. The tour consisted of a three-day tour match against a SLCB President's XI, three Test matches, five One Day International and two Twenty20 International matches. The third Test was originally scheduled to be played at the R Premadasa Stadium, but was changed to the Pallekele International Cricket Stadium in early May.
The Sri Lanka cricket team toured the United Arab Emirates in September and October 2017 to play two Tests, five One Day Internationals (ODIs) and three Twenty20 International (T20I) matches against the Pakistan cricket team. It included the first Tests that Sarfaraz Ahmed of Pakistan captained following the retirement of Misbah-ul-Haq. The tour also featured a T20I match in Pakistan, the first time that Sri Lanka had visited the country since 2009.
The Sri Lankan cricket team toured Pakistan in September and October 2019 to play three One Day Internationals (ODIs) and three Twenty20 International (T20I) matches against the Pakistan cricket team. The tour originally had two Test matches scheduled to take place, but these were moved to December 2019. Sri Lanka last played a match in Pakistan in October 2017, when the third T20I took place at the Gaddafi Stadium in Lahore. Pakistan won the ODI series 2–0, after the first match was washed out, and Sri Lanka won the T20I series 3–0.
The Pakistan cricket team toured Sri Lanka in July 2022 to play two Test matches against the Sri Lankan cricket team. The Test series formed part of the 2021–2023 ICC World Test Championship. In April 2022, the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) confirmed that the series would be taking place. Originally, the tour was also going to include three One Day International (ODI) matches, but these were cancelled in May 2022, as they were not part of the 2020–2023 ICC Cricket World Cup Super League. The fixtures for the tour were confirmed in June 2022. Pakistan last toured Sri Lanka for a Test series in June and July 2015. On 17 July 2022, Sri Lanka Cricket moved the second Test from the R. Premadasa Stadium in Colombo to the Galle International Stadium due to the economic crisis in the country.
