Wedagedara Sadeera Rashen Samarawickrama (born 30 August 1995) is a professional Sri Lankan

cricket Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by striki ...

er who represents the national team in Tests but has represented in all formats of the game. He was part of Sri Lanka's squad for the 2014 ICC Under-19 Cricket World Cup. He is a past pupil of St. Josephs College,

Colombo Colombo ( ; si, කොළඹ, translit=Koḷam̆ba, ; ta, கொழும்பு, translit=Koḻumpu, ) is the executive and judicial capital and largest city of Sri Lanka by population. According to the Brookings Institution, Colombo me ...

Domestic career

He made the most runs in the

2016–17 Premier League Tournament The 2016–17 Premier League Tournament was the 29th season of first-class cricket in Sri Lanka's Premier Trophy. Fourteen teams competed, split into two groups of seven. Burgher Recreation Club replaced Sri Lanka Ports Authority Cricket Club, ...

, with a total of 1,016 from 10 matches and 19 innings. In November 2017, he was named the best batsman in domestic cricket for the 2016–17 season at

Sri Lanka Cricket Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) is the governing body for cricket in Sri Lanka. It was first registered with the Sri Lankan Ministry of Sports (Sri Lanka), Ministry of Sports as the Board of Cricket for Sri Lanka (BCCSL) on 30 June 1975 as a national spo ...

's annual awards. In March 2018, he was named in Galle's squad for the

2017–18 Super Four Provincial Tournament The 2017–18 Super Four Provincial Tournament was a first-class cricket tournament, that was played in Sri Lanka during March and April 2018. It took place following the conclusion of the 2017–18 Premier League Tournament and featured four t ...

. The following month, he was also named in Galle's squad for the

2018 Super Provincial One Day Tournament The 2018 Super Provincial One Day Tournament was a List A cricket tournament that was played in Sri Lanka between 2 May and 10 June 2018, following the conclusion of the 2017–18 Super Four Provincial Tournament. Four teams took part in the co ...

. In August 2018, he was named in Dambulla's squad the

2018 SLC T20 League The 2018 SLC T20 League was a domestic Twenty20 cricket tournament that was held in Sri Lanka, between 21 August and 2 September 2018. Four teams took part in the tournament: Colombo, Dambulla, Galle and Kandy. The Rangiri Dambulla International ...

. In February 2019, in the first day of the

2018–19 SLC Twenty20 Tournament The 2018–19 SLC Twenty20 Tournament was a Twenty20 cricket tournament that was held in Sri Lanka. It was played between twenty-four domestic teams in Sri Lanka, with the tournament running from 15 to 27 February 2019. Nondescripts Cricket Clu ...

, Samarawickrama scored an unbeaten century for

Colts Cricket Club Colts Cricket Club is a first-class cricket team based in Colombo, Sri Lanka. They have won 6 first class tournaments of Sri Lanka domestic league as in 1991/92, 1999/2000, 2001/02, 2004/05, 2008/09 and 2011/12 and 2 Premier Limited Overs Tourn ...

against Police Sports Club. In March 2019, he was named in Kandy's squad for the

2019 Super Provincial One Day Tournament The 2019 Super Provincial One Day Tournament was a List A cricket tournament that was played in Sri Lanka between 4 and 11 April 2019. Four teams took part in the competition: Colombo, Dambulla, Galle and Kandy, with Galle being the defending ch ...

. In August 2021, he was named in the SLC Blues team for the 2021 SLC Invitational T20 League tournament. In July 2022, he was signed by the

Jaffna Kings Jaffna Kings, formerly known as Jaffna Stallions, are a franchise cricket team which plays in the Lanka Premier League (LPL). On December 16, 2020, the team won the inaugural Lanka Premier League 2020 Championship and are the current title hold ...

for the third edition of the

Lanka Premier League The Lanka Premier League (abbreviated as LPL; , ) is a professional cricket league in Sri Lanka in Twenty20 format contested every year by teams representing Sri Lankan cities from 2020. The league was founded by Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) in 201 ...

International career

Samarawickrama was part of the Sri Lankan team in the

ACC Emerging Teams Asia Cup 2017 The 2017 ACC Emerging Teams Asia Cup was the second edition of the ACC Emerging Teams Asia Cup held in Bangladesh. Eight teams participated in the tournament including four under-23 age level teams of Test cricket, Test nations and four top Asian ...

tournament. He scored 45 runs in the final to win the low scoring match against Pakistan. This was the first time that Sri Lanka went onto win the tournament. In September 2017, he was named in Sri Lanka's

Test Test(s), testing, or TEST may refer to: * Test (assessment), an educational assessment intended to measure the respondents' knowledge or other abilities Arts and entertainment * ''Test'' (2013 film), an American film * ''Test'' (2014 film), ...

squad for their series against Pakistan in the United Arab Emirates. He made his Test debut for Sri Lanka against Pakistan on 6 October 2017 in Sri Lanka's first day-night Test match. In the first innings, he scored 38 runs and had a swift 68-run stand with centurion

Dimuth Karunaratne Frank Dimuth Madushanka Karunaratne (born 21 April 1988; si, දිමුත් කරුණාරත්න), popularly known as Dimuth Karunaratne, is a professional Sri Lankan cricketer and current captain of the Sri Lanka Test cricket team. ...

. His inside-out drives to

Yasir Shah Yasir Shah SI (; born 2 May 1986) is an international cricketer from Pakistan. He plays as a bowler, and is the joint-second fastest bowler in the history of Test cricket to take 100 wickets, as well as also being the fastest to pick up 200 wi ...

was described similar to that of maestro

Mahela Jayawardena Denagamage Praboth Mahela de Silva Jayawardene ( si, දෙනගමගේ ප්‍රබෝත් මහේල ද සිල්වා ජයවර්ධන; born 27 May 1977) is a former Sri Lankan cricketer who is the current consultant coach ...

's stroke play by critics. In October 2017, he was named in Sri Lanka's

One Day Internationals A One Day International (ODI) is a form of limited overs cricket, played between two teams with international status, in which each team faces a fixed number of overs, currently 50, with the game lasting up to 9 hours. The Cricket World Cu ...

(ODI) squad for their series against Pakistan in the United Arab Emirates. He made his ODI debut for Sri Lanka against Pakistan on 20 October 2017. He was dismissed for nought in both matches, becoming the third batsman after

Sachin Tendulkar Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar (; ; born 24 April 1973) is an Indian former international cricketer who captained the Indian national team. He is regarded as one of the greatest batsmen in the history of cricket. He is the all time highest run-scor ...

and

Kane Williamson Kane Stuart Williamson (born 8 August 1990) is a New Zealand cricketer who is currently the Captain (cricket), captain of the New Zealand national cricket team, New Zealand national team in limited overs cricket. He is considered as New Zealand' ...

to dismissed for nought in first two ODIs. Later the same month, he was named in Sri Lanka's

Twenty20 International A Twenty20 International (T20I) is a form of cricket, played between two of the international members of the International Cricket Council (ICC), in which each team faces a maximum of twenty overs. The matches have top-class status and are the ...

(T20I) squad for their series also against Pakistan. He made his T20I debut for Sri Lanka against Pakistan on 26 October 2017, keeping wicket in the match. In May 2018, he was one of 33 cricketers to be awarded a national contract by

ahead of the 2018–19 season. In June 2022, he was named in the Sri Lanka A squad for their matches against Australia A during Australia's tour of Sri Lanka. In April 2023, Samarawickrama returned to the Sri Lanka's Test squad after six years for their series against Ireland. On 17 April 2023, during the first Test, he scored his maiden

century A century is a period of 100 years. Centuries are numbered ordinally in English and many other languages. The word ''century'' comes from the Latin ''centum'', meaning ''one hundred''. ''Century'' is sometimes abbreviated as c. A centennial or ...

in Test cricket, and became the first Sri Lankan wicket-keeper to score a century since 2016. His score of 104 runs was also the highest score by a Sri Lankan player while batting at Number 8 or lower in Tests.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Samarawickrama, Sadeera 1995 births Living people Sri Lankan cricketers Sri Lanka Test cricketers Sri Lanka One Day International cricketers Sri Lanka Twenty20 International cricketers Cricketers from Colombo Colombo Commandos cricketers Colts Cricket Club cricketers Kegalle District cricketers Wicket-keepers