Meet Kamindu Mendis, the 25-year-old who has touched Sir Don Bradman’s feat

It’s been a long time since the departure of the Sangakkaras and Jayawardenes that a young Sri Lankan batter has become the talking point in the sport – and how. Kamindu Mendis, the 25-year-old from Galle, took the cricketing world by storm when he equalled a scoring landmark of the great Sir Don Bradman by reaching 1000 Test runs in only 13 innings on Friday, 27 September.  

Just ponder this – the alumni of Galle’s Richmond College became the second fastest batter in history after Sir Everton Weekes and Herbert Sutcliffe (12 innings) to reach 1000 runs and be the fastest to achieve the feat in 75 years. The landmark came in style in the second Test against the visiting New Zealanders when Kamindu finished on a career-best, unbeaten 182 on Friday – his fifth century in first eight Test innings.

He must have kept the statisticians busy on Friday when they dug up the fact that he was the fastest-ever Asian to 1000 Test runs, bettering Vinod Kambli, who reached it in 14 innings. No wonder, such consistency so early on in his career has left all and sundry in awe – making it special since Kamindu has never batted higher than number five so far in a fledgling Test career starting in 2022.

 And if that’s not enough, the gritty left-hander is now second in the all-time list of batters in terms of their runs after the first eight Tests. While the incomparable Sir Don tops this list too with 1210 runs, the Sri Lankan is on 1004 while India’s Yashasvi Jaiswal had scored 971 runs. Kamindu is also the first batter to score a 50-plus innings in each of his first eight Tests.

It’s a hot streak which is too good to be true – which makes one wonder as to why the national selectors jettisoned him after a highly impressive debut against Australia in Galle when he got into the groove with an innings of 61. The emergence of an extraordinary talent like Kamindu in the lower middle order could not be better-timed as Sri Lanka are looking good for a push to their Test fortunes are now poised ahead of New Zealand and England in as high as the third spot in the World Test Championship (WTC) 2024-25 rankings.  

 The teammates have been lavish in their praise and Angelo Matthews, the senior statesman of the team, said: ‘’Kamindu Mendis has been sensational for us this year. He is doing stuff that none of us were able to do early in our careers. He is very mature, knows his game, and plays very positively. Even in the first Test, we were under tremendous pressure after a collapse and he rescued us with a hundred. He just kept on batting. It was a terrific knock.’’

Interestingly, his five Test centuries have come under different conditions – always a challenge for a newcomer in the longer format. The centuries against Bangladesh earlier in the year on wickets where batting was not easy, followed by the one on a seaming track against England at Manchester while the last two came on the turning track of Galle.

‘’I do basic things and try to keep calm in the middle,’’ he said after his century in England. ‘’What I wanted was to do what I could on the day for the team. That’s really my only goal: to give as much to my team as possible whether on the batting front, bowling front, or via fielding.’’

What made Kamindu wait for nearly two years to return to Test cricket after stepping in for the Covid-positive Dhananjaya de Silva against Australia in Galle? Looking back at his time on the sidelines while on England tour, Kamindu told the ICC website: ‘’I knew that the batting was packed, but what I tried to do was to do as best as I could in the chance that I had. I had to exit the team after that but I don’t see that as a mistake.

“You have to take various decisions to balance a team and I came into that side only because Dhananjaya had Covid. When he returned, I had to make way. That’s fair.

Patience finally paid off when he got another chance earlier this year against Bangladesh, and Kamindu seized it with both hands to hit centuries in each Test. Accumulating 367 runs, three wickets (yes, he is ambi-dexterous who bowls left-arm orthodox and right-arm off spinners) and earning the Player of the Series award, his returns were nothing short of stellar.

He did not have to look back ever since…