English Article

A school cricket highlights video. The caption reads — "Passion. Pride. Intensity." Below it, small text: 33rd Dr. R.L. Hayman Trophy, 2nd Leg, S. Thomas' College vs Royal College. I clicked it. The video is four minutes twelve seconds long. Three minutes forty-five seconds of it is pavilion crowd, old-badge alumni with hands on shoulders, a flag flapping red and blue. Cricket-wise there is very little — a few shots, one catch, one stumping. But watching it from my house in Khulna, at eleven at night, one thought kept circling: what is not in this four-minute video is the actual story.

I have watched cricket for 39 years. I first heard the name Royal-Thomian in 2026, from a senior journalist visiting from Colombo. He said, "They don't play cricket there. They make history." I thought it was literary exaggeration. Later I understood he was not wrong. Since 1879, this contest between two schools has been running. Two world wars, multiple post-colonial crises, Sri Lanka's civil war, the 2026 tsunami — through all of it this match has been played. I have seen very few cricket events in my lifetime whose continuity has beaten war and disaster.

But what exactly is the Hayman Trophy? Here is the first complication. Outsiders think this is 'The Big Match' — that three-day long-format epic between Royal and Thomians. It is not. The Big Match and the Hayman Trophy are two different competitions, two different stories unfolding in the same season. The Big Match is the main cathedral — two innings, three or four days, traditional whites, evening tea break, 'Blue' and 'Thomian' written on the scorecard. The Hayman Trophy is a limited-overs, professional-era, two-leg modern format. The 2nd Leg in 2026 is thus a supplementary chapter to the main narrative — not a minor character, but not the opening act either.

This distinction matters to me because there is a real risk of misreading here. I have seen domestic media conflate these two competitions many times. The highlights promo writes 'thrilling encounter,' but in what format, how many overs, at what venue — nothing. The news becomes emotion, not information. I remember a 2026 experience. By then I had left journalism and was writing esports. A friend called: "I need data on a school match." I asked which school. He said, "You know, the one that comes on TV." There is the problem. We conflate highlights and match, promo and result, trophy and tournament.

What does school cricket data even mean? I first asked this question in 2026, watching the Lankan Premier League player list. By then Ranjit Madanayake, Arjuna Ranatunga, Kumar Sangakkara — all had emerged from one of these two schools. But no school-era statistics existed anywhere. ESPNcricinfo has U-19 careers, domestic matches, but where is the school-level average? Nowhere. This is a major void. If a 17-year-old scores 80 off 50 in the Hayman Trophy, it is recorded nowhere, because it is 'school cricket,' not 'serious cricket.'

This is my core argument. The cricket-economy pyramid we draw has school cricket at the very bottom — a blurred base with no numbers. But if the pyramid is to be pushed from the top, that base has to be read as a signal. Sri Lanka's national team history is essentially a reading of this base. The 2026 World Cup-winning squad — Arjuna, Aravinda, Romesh, Sanath, Murali — how many from these two schools? Not half, but four of nine names. All four emerged without any tracked data. Only scout eyes, a master-in-charge's letter, and alumni whispers in the pavilion.

Twenty-six years later, in 2026, I wrote a column from Khulna for The Daily Star Bangla edition titled 'Where does the column live when the stadium empties.' Its main premise was football columns dying during Covid. But I wrote about school cricket too — how alumni crowds at school matches never thin even when stadiums empty. Because it is not a cricket-consumer thing, it is a cricket-memory thing. Ask a 70-year-old Colombo school man what Pakistan did last night — he may not know. But he can tell you what colour tie he wore at the 2026 Big Match. That memory economy has no model.

But here is my hesitation. Does this heritage-media product actually contribute to cricket development? Or is it a self-referential hangout, where those who went to the school chat among themselves, and those who did not are excluded?

I want to turn this question around. Suppose in the 2026 Hayman Trophy 2nd Leg, a 16-year-old left-arm spinner from S. Thomas' takes 3 wickets in 10 overs. Where does the scorecard go? Local portal, highlights caption, maybe the school Facebook page. Will his name reach Sri Lanka's domestic system? Very likely not. Because the path from school to domestic is recorded in no database. It happens through scouts' eyes. This system has an advantage — it inherently sees merit, not social media numbers. But the disadvantage is greater — in this system only what is seen survives. Those in or near Colombo, whose schools have good coaches, who have contacts — they are the catchers. Outsiders are never tracked.

I think of cricket in my own country, Canada, in Ontario schools. Every match score is online — on Cricket Ontario's site, every innings, every bowler's economy rate. Why? Because it is a system, not mere emotion. But that system has a cost — what the system measures becomes what matters. I have seen this transformation in esports. In a 2026 LCK match, nobody knew who did how much damage, because it was muted in the VOD. After 2026, Riot Games made all API data public. Today ten thousand fans track each player's KDA.

Is this transformation coming to school cricket? Maybe, maybe not. A major problem for Sri Lanka Cricket is that it has no tracked pipeline data. The ICC has launched a junior player rating system, but where does it start? Not at school, at provincial level. Meaning the first step is dark.

Here I arrive at the second complication. If there is no data, highlights are the only mirror. What the highlights video shows, becomes 'the match.' If the 26 May 2026 highlights contain some spectacular catches, fielding will appear to have won the match. But if the actual match was a low-scoring, pitch-dominated, tiring contest, the highlights will not capture it. Because the job of highlights is to create thrill, not to show cricket's patience.

Here I have a complaint against media practice. By reducing school cricket to highlights, what are we actually doing? We are turning a process into an event. Cricket is inherently slow, disciplined, long-term skill. At school level, even more so. Behind one over, one delivery, one shot, there are years of practice. That cannot be captured in highlights. Highlights capture only the 'wow!' And 'wow!' is cricket's enemy. Because we all wait for 'wow!' and the process is lost.

Let me pause here on a personal note. In November 2026, when I left the football desk, my editor said, "You are leaving a 150-year-old game for a 15-year-old game." I said, "No, I am moving into a big chat room, where nobody can hide." Now, at 55, looking back, I made the right call. Because esports taught me — data, context, and repetition. Not highlights, replays. Highlights show who won. Replays show why.

I have a clear position on the Hayman Trophy, and I state it because I believe it. The real value of this trophy is not in the scorecard, but elsewhere. It is a heritage product — in economic terms, a 'legacy asset.' There are cricket properties in the world with no market valuation but immense cultural value. Royal-Thomian, Eton-Harrow, Radley-Harrow — these competitions are not professional cricket's consumers, they are professional cricket's memory. Their market does not grow daily, but they also never reach zero.

But there is a risk. If this heritage product is kept only as heritage, it is detrimental to the professional pipeline. Because the biggest scouting channel cannot be tracked — it is old-days pavilion gossip. Someone from outside school cricket cannot come in unless there is information before them. I believe Sri Lanka Cricket should put every school match score online. It is not expensive. ESPNcricinfo has tools for this. Even a Google Sheet would work. The real question is where the interest lies.

I do not want to be cruel to emotion. Because what this competition holds is not cricket, it is a community. The 33rd edition means 33 times the same thought, same anxiety, same pride. This continuity will remain 50 years from now, I believe. Because a school that can build an alumni community will never let its cricket team die.

But one thing I want to specifically challenge. This trophy is named Dr. R.L. Hayman. How many fans — even how many players — know who Dr. Hayman was? I did not know until seven years ago. He was a British-Sri Lankan educationist who made a substantial contribution to school cricket. But our media never looks behind the name. We keep the trophy only as symbol. This illiteracy is a fatal flaw in our heritage practice. We celebrate memory, but forget the person in the memory.

Similarly, we do not know any player's name in this match today, but 20 years later a national star may emerge from here. Then we will search for the highlights video — but is he in it? We do not know. Because school cricket is a dark spot in its place.

So what is the value of this four-minute highlights video? To me, its value is a signal — school cricket is still alive, still creates audience, is still broadcast. But it is not material for professional analysis. It is an emotional document. It is a memorial. It should be read that way — as a heritage event notice, not a cricket data point. Because if there is no score, where is cricket?

Ultimately the question remains here. This highlights video was not made for anyone outside the school. But why do I — a man outside the school — stop at this video? Because it carries a message that has been lost in professional cricket — that a game is something bigger than winning and losing. I may understand this more at 55. But for a 16-year-old ball-boy, it is everyday truth.

And from this place, my next work begins. I am starting a small server back in Khulna — where every match, every over, every wicket of Bangladesh and Sri Lanka school cricket will be logged. Maybe too small, maybe lacking. But maybe a 16-year-old boy emerging from this 33-year-old competition, if he can see his own score, will know his story is written somewhere. That may be far more important than this highlights video. Cricket will go on. The 2027 edition may be the 34th. But we must write our memory, or in the next 33 years nobody will know what happened.