Introduction
Born on 30th May 1983 in Ragama, Dhammika Prasad played the role of a bowler in cricket. Although his international cricketing career wasn’t that prolific in terms of the number of matches he played, he gave Sri Lankan cricket a lot.
His career was greatly affected by injuries. These injuries affected him a lot since he couldn’t be a part of the playing eleven because of them. Now, let us discuss his domestic cricketing career.
Dhammika Prasad Domestic Career
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First-class
He played 128 first-class matches in which he took 344 wickets. His personal best record stood at 6/25. He also managed to take five wickets in an innings five times.
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List A
In the 119 List A matches that he played, he was able to take 154 wickets. His overall economy is also decent and currently stands at 5.00. While his record stands at 4/39.
Dhammika Prasad International Career
He has represented his country in all three major international cricketing formats.
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ODI Career
He played 24 ODI matches for the Lankan team, in which he took 32 wickets. His best bowling performance stood at 3/17. While he used to play as a bowler, he had a batting average of 21.50 in ODI cricket.
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Test Career
In twenty-five test matches, he managed to take 75 wickets in total. His best bowling performance stands at 5/50. He was also able to take five wickets in an innings once.
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T20I Career
He played just a single T20I match and wasn’t able to take a wicket. Although, he did bowl three overs in that match.
Dhammika Prasad Height
He is five feet ten inches (1.78 metres) tall.
Personal life
He is currently married to Nihari Kariyawasam, and the couple had a child in the year 2016. He conveyed this to his fans via social networking site Twitter.
Dhammika Prasad ODI Debut
He made his One Day International debut on 25th February 2006 against the Bangladesh cricket team. Prasad bowled six overs in which he was able to take a couple of wickets. He also managed to bowl a maiden over too.
Bangladesh won the toss, and they decided to field first. The Lankans managed to put up 309 runs for seven wickets in the fifty overs of their innings.
Kumar Sangakkara hit a century (109 runs in 125 balls), and the then skipper Mahela Jayawardene and his teammate Kaushal Lokuarachchi also smashed half-centuries. They scored 51 and 69 runs respectively.
In response to this, Bangladesh was able to score just 231 runs and was defeated by 78 runs. Besides Mohammed Ashraful (64 runs), no one was able to achieve much.
It was a decent debut for Dhammika since he was able to contribute to the victory of the Sri Lankan cricket team.
Dhammika Prasad Test Debut
Incidentally, he made his test cricket debut on 8th August 2008 against India in Colombo. In the first Indian innings, he successfully sent three Indian batsmen back to the pavilion. While we know that he is mainly a bowler, he did contribute 36 runs as a batsman in Sri Lanka’s first innings.
During India’s second innings, he again took a couple of wickets. But he was the most uneconomical bowler of all. Nevertheless, he took the total number of wickets taken by him in this match to five.
Sri Lanka went on to win the test match together with the series (2-1). Kumar Sangakkara was declared to be the man of the match, while Ajantha Mendis secured the title of man of the series. With regards to Dhammika, it was a great debut since he did his part well enough. Like we said before, he might have played a smaller number of matches, but he has contributed a lot.
Dhammika Prasad T20 Debut
As we said before, he played just one T20 match in his international career. The match took place on 6th August 2011 against the Australian cricket team in Kandy. He bowled three overs and wasn’t able to take a single wicket. Instead, he was the most uneconomical bowler (economy rate: 12.33 runs per over).
The Australians won the toss and decided to bowl first. The Lankans managed to smash 198 runs in 20 overs. Skipper Tillakaratne Dilshan was the star of the show since he hit a century (104 runs in 57 balls). He was aided by Kumar Sangakkara (30 runs) and Jeevan Mendis (29 runs).
Brett Lee was the most successful Australian bowler. While chasing the massive target of 199 runs, Australia tried their best but managed to score just 163 runs. Opener David Warner was the highest scorer with a score of 53 runs. It wasn’t that great a debut for Prasad.
Dhammika Prasad Last Test
He played his last Test against the West Indies team, which started on 22nd October 2015. He managed to take four wickets in the first innings while taking a wicket in the second innings. Sri Lankan cricket team won this match by 72 runs. Overall, he performed well.
Dhammika Prasad Last ODI
The last ODI he played in his international ODI career was against the New Zealand cricket team on 25th January 2015. He bowled ten overs and managed to take a couple of wickets. His economy was also decent (5.90). But Sri Lanka, unfortunately, lost the game by 120 runs.
Dhammika Prasad Retirement
Dhammika Prasad announced his retirement on 18th February 2021. He last played for the Sri Lankan team in October 2015, after which he could not because of his shoulder injury. Many former Sri Lankan cricketing legends like Rangana Herath and Marvan Atapattu shared their views on his excellent cricketing skills.
He thanked everyone who contributed to his international career. Although he did play his last match in 2015, he did try his best to get back into the national team, but things weren’t just the same for him since his shoulder injury.
The Sri Lankan cricket board‘s Twitter account also paid its respects and asked the cricket fans to share their favourite ‘Dhammika Prasad Moment’. Hopefully, he will guide and coach young Sri Lankan potential pacers with their bowling skills. It would be impossible to know how his career may have gone had he not had the fateful injury.
