Dellon continues to impress
By the end of the eighth week count of the Dialog 4G-the Sunday Times Most Popular Sch o o l b oy / Schoolgirl Cricketer of the Year 2018 competition Dellon Peiris of S. Thomas' College has doubled his count from his nearest rival in the All-Island Schools.
Dellon, the top left- arm spinner of S. Thomas', has added 1207 combined votes which moved his tally to 4869 and gained a lead of 2681 from Sachin Silva of St. Peter's College.
Dellon's pace looks very healthy as he comfortably moves forward as the leader of the All-Island Schools for the fourth consecutive week. Sachin, meanwhile added 511 combined votes, which took his count to 2188 and Kavin Peiris from Lumbini College remains at third despite his small addition of 71 votes.
However Ananda College skipper Asel Sigera made a great stride from sixth to fourth after receiving 797 votes while Dulaj Bandara of Dharmaraja College and Kalana Perera of S. Thomas' slid down a place each to fifth and sixth positions respectively from a list of 17 cricketers from Division I schools.
Ananda Sasthralaya cricketer Sonara Karunathunga continues to lead the Emerging Schools category while his team mate Thimira Malshan follows behind closely at second for yet another week. Sonara obtained 301 combined votes as his count reaches 986 while Thimira received 354 votes to reach 705. But the actual winners of this category are Kenula Gunarathne of St. Aloysius Ratnapura and Denuwan Perera of Carey College. Kenula leaped from fifth to third with the addition of 407 votes and a count of 464 while Denuwan's accumulation of 321 takes his count to 420 and remains at fourth
Coupons will be published from October 1 in the Sunday Times and it will follow throughout the week in the two English dailies, the Daily Mirror and DailyFT, and the two Sinhala dailies, Daily Lankadeepa and Ada and Sinhala Weekend, Deshaya. Coupons will run for 26 weeks with the deadline set for April 5, 2018. Readers could vote for their favourite schoolboy or schoolgirl cricketer and take them to the winning post during this period.
In addition Dialog Axiata's online voting system through their official Online Portal to vote for the Most Popular Cricketer
came alive from October 1 with player registrations. The digital voting mechanism will have its usual procedure as last season where all players must register online. Players who wish to enter the fray will have to confirm their participation by registering online with
from October 1 to November 30. Even schoolboy cricketers whose names are entered into the competition by readers must register before that deadline. To validate their registration players should also be registered under the Sri Lanka Schools Cricket Association (SLSCA) with a valid registration number. Players without a valid registration from SLSCA will not be included in any category of the Most Popular position. Pulitha Yasas of Sri Sumangala Panadura was forced to back down to fifth position from third.
Harsh i tha Samarawickrama of Anula Vidyalaya, who shot to the top position of the Girls' Category, maintains her lead with a healthy count of 819, which was further bol- competition. The decision of the Deputy Editor -- Sports of the Sunday Times will be final.
Names of players who registered online during the month of October were officially scrutinised of their eligibility and entered to the online voting mechanism from November 1, while the customary voting through coupons will be still on. From November 1, the Online Portal will be opened for voting while online registration will be still accepted up to November 30. During the month of November, the names of registered players will be released weekly, every Wednesday while the cutoff date for weekly scrutinising will be the previous Friday of each week. Online voting will be open from November 1 to April 5, 2018.
Both coupon votes and online votes will be counted on a weekly basis and the official results published every week beginning next Sunday in the five newspapers and its websites.
The deadline for COUPONS will be every Thursday Noon while the weekly cutoff for ONLINE VOTES will be every Wednesday Noon. Online Votes received after the weekly cutoff time will be counted for the next week, while for Coupons, ONLY those numbered for the particular week will be taken into count. This week's digital voting count was monitored and approved by auditors Pricewaterhouse Cooper. stered by the addition of 232 combined votes. Kaveesha Dilhari of Devapathiraja College, Rathgama, has slowed down a bit, but remains at second place with 51 votes, 768 votes behind Harshitha. The category welcomes another contestant, Pabasara Ranabahu of Rathnavali Girls' School, Gampaha, who lands in at third place ahead of Ru w i n i Nandasena of St. Joseph's Girls' School.