Ashan Priyanjan

Ashan Priyanjan is a batting all-rounder who promised plenty and has delivered in spades. He represented Sri Lanka through the age-groups, skippered the Under-19s at the 2008 Youth World Cup, made his first-class debut in his teens, and has gone on to play almost 500 domestic, including 26 international, matches. He has 15,000 plus runs and almost 300 wickets to his name.

Through sheer weight of runs, Priyanjan was finally rewarded with the first of his 23 ODI’s in December 2013. He struck a sparkling 74 on debut against Pakistan and became a white ball regular, featuring in series wins in the Asia Cup and the bilateral series against England in 2014. A busy middle-order batter and economical off-spin bowler, Priyanjan played his last ODI in 2015 but returned to the national fold to play 3 T20 internationals in Sept/Oct 2017.

At domestic level, the all-rounder has lorded both first-class and List A cricket, in particular. He earned his national selection courtesy of season tallies of 409 runs at 45.44 (2011/12), 586 runs at 45.07 (2012/13), 676 runs at 61.45 plus 15 wickets at 20.53 (2013/14), and 850 runs at 50 (2014/15).

Since his final ODI match, he has continued his shine with 534 runs at 48.54 in List A cricket (and 21 wickets at 20.66 in red ball) in 2016/17, before a strong 2017/18 season hitting 825 runs at 43.24 (first-class) and 279 runs at 55.80 (List A), alongside 21 wickets at 27.23 (2017/18) during the former.

In 2018/19, he continued to shine hitting 2 centuries amongst 709 runs at 54.53 alongside 20 wickets at 28.50 in first-class cricket. He replicated his form, once again, in 2019/20 with a further 393 runs at 43.66 and 25 wickets at 18.40.

Post COVID, unsurprisingly Priyanjan has starred - 273 runs at 39 (2021/22), and 698 runs at 34.90 / 52 wickets at 25.52 (2022/23) in first-class cricket, alongside 34 wickets at 10.44 (2022), and 10 wickets at 15 during the most recent List A campaigns with the ball.

The all-rounder has been involved with the Sri Lankan A and Board XI sides in recent years and, in-fact, skippered both during their tour to India, plus pre-Test series matches against the touring Blackcaps. He also struck 50 for the Board XI (before retiring out) against a full-strength England attack featuring the likes of Jimmy Anderson, Stuart Broad, Chris Woakes, Sam Curran, Moeen Ali, and Adil Rashid a few years ago, before another fifty-plus score (77) against England in March 2020.

Priyanjan is a high-class professional, who is set to return to the UK next summer following his short stint Morecambe in 2017.