‘Our favourite moment as fans happened in Bangladesh’

During the T20I series, there were perhaps just two (yes you read that right, just two) Sri Lankan fans at the stadium in Sylhet.

However, these two Sri Lankans are common faces in Sri Lanka's home and away games, for the last two decades.

Gayan Senanayake and Nilam Mohamed are the two, as people these days would say - superfans - of the Sri Lankan team.

Percy Abeysekera, known more commonly as Uncle Percy, was the first such superfan of the Sri Lankan cricket team and weaved a way for more such superfans from different countries, passing away recently.

Gayan and Nilam spoke about their experiences in Bangladesh and various other countries in an exclusive interview with The Business Standard.

The Bangladesh-Sri Lanka cricket rivalry is perhaps one of the fastest-growing cricket rivalries in world cricket and one of the first instances of the rivalry growing was the 'Naagin (snake) Dance' the Bangladesh players did after defeating Sri Lanka in the 2018 Nidahas Trophy.

The dance originated from off-spinner Nazmul Islam Apu doing the celebration after taking a wicket.

Gayan recalled a moment when he was watching Apu bowl in Bangladesh before the Nidahas Trophy, in a bilateral series against Sri Lanka and saw the 'Naagin Dance' for the first time.

"This was where I first saw that dance you know," he said.

"It's my 19th tour outside of Sri Lanka and my sixth tour to Bangladesh," Gayan adds.

One of Gayan and Nilam's favourite memories of watching and following the Sri Lankan cricket team has been the T20I World Cup win in Bangladesh.

"In Mirpur, the atmosphere was electric and fans were mostly supporting us against India. It will probably be our favourite moment supporting Sri Lanka of all time," Nilam explained. 

Gayan says that they've been to every country that plays Test cricket "apart from Pakistan, West Indies and Zimbabwe".

One of those places, the West Indies will be visited by them later this year as they will go watch the T20 World Cup, which will be jointly hosted by the US and the West Indies.

"We've really enjoyed visiting Australia and New Zealand as they have big stadiums and nice weather. But Bangladesh is also a nice place to visit. The people here are very welcoming," Nilam says.

Controversy ensued during the 2nd T20I between Bangladesh and Sri Lanka as Soumya Sarkar was given out caught behind but the third umpire overturned the decision despite there being a nick on the Snicko meter.

According to the third umpire Masudur Rahman, the nick appeared when the ball had passed the bat and there was a clear gap between bat and ball.

That decision did not go down well with the Sri Lankan team and they complained about the matter to the match referee after the match, asking for an explanation.

Gayan spoke on the matter saying: "I didn't see it on TV but in the stadium, I saw the umpire giving it out. And then we saw the nick as well on the giant screen."

He felt there might have been an issue with technology for which they couldn't get the timing of the nick properly.

"Remember the 2011 World Cup semifinal between India and Pakistan when Sachin Tendulkar was batting, and he was given out LBW but then DRS changed the decision even though it looked out. Anyways, Bangladesh played well and all credit to them," he concluded.