Dribblers Basketball Academy from Dubai to tour Sri Lanka

Dribblers Basketball Academy (DBA) formed less than three years ago in Dubai, will make its international debut when they embark on a tour of Sri Lanka later this month.

The DBA squad comprising three groups of 12 each (Under 12 boys, Under 13 girls and Under 16 boys) will play matches in Colombo and Kandy against school and club teams from July 25 to 31.

Boys Under 16 captain Naveen Arukgoda of St Marys Catholic High School was looking forward to the experience of playing against teams in Sri Lanka.

"I think it's going to be fun, a different experience," said the gangly player who has ambitions of playing college basketball in USA.

"I play mostly basketball. I have been coming to this academy for a long time. All the coaches really helped me to become better player. I can see most of these other guys, have become way better to what they were before. Everybody is passing the ball and playing well," said Arukgoda who follows the exploits of Miami Heat and San Antonio Spurs while his favourite NBA stars are Lebron James and Tim Duncan.

They are scheduled to play three matches each day from July 25-27 in Kandy and July 29-31 in Colombo.

The opposition in Kandy will be Colombo International School, Kingswood, Trinity, St Anthony's Girls, Hillwood and St Anne’s, Kurunegala.

Their opponents in Colombo will be Royal College, St Peter's College and Colombo Basketball Academy, Visakha Vidyalaya, St. Joseph's and Ladies College.

Founded on May 7, 2011 by former Sri Lanka basketball captain Sujith Croos, the DBA has swelled from a small group of eight dribblers to 100 members attracting the expatriate community from Sri Lanka, India, Egypt, Philippines and Pakistan.

Establishing a basketball academy has been a dream come true for Croos, who has represented Sri Lanka at youth level (Under 17 Asian Championship in Doha 1987) and regularly at senior level from 1990-2000, the last three years as captain.

Since the age of 15 he had ambitions of becoming a basketball coach but it nearly ended when he relocated for employment to Dubai in 2000.

"I thought my dream of coaching is gone," said Croos, 44, a Unit Manager at Metlife Insurance.

He rekindled it by starting to coach free in parks in 2010.

"I have done some coaching courses in Sri Lanka. I always had a dream to become a coach so first I started free classes. After that I wanted it to become more professional, so I started an academy," said Croos, who has taken part in Asian Basketball Championships in Japan, Korea, Singapore, Malaysia, India and Philippines, having played basketball since the age of nine.

DBA have taken part in several local tournaments and are now embarking on their maiden overseas tour. The team has been training thrice a week at Mizhar Sports Hall in Dubai.

The objective of the tour is to build unity playing as a team within a multicultural community, said Nirupa Croos, wife of Head Coach Sujith.

"We want the children to understand each person's differences, respect all that and to be like a family, a team because playing in a team is not easy. Now it's a real competition age and everyone wants to beat each other. In basketball it's different. If you don't play as a team you don't really succeed. We are training children to work as a team. Unity is strength," said Nirupa who quit her career as a banker to focus full-time at DBA.

"The idea was to teach proper basketball fundamentals. We wanted them to be busy in Dubai since physical fitness is very rarely thought about. Here we not only teach basketball we emphasise a lot on physical fitness. We give them a fitness chart to do at home. We actually thought to have a generation where they are really fit and healthy and also to give the best in basketball," said Nirupa explaining the aims of starting the academy.

Sujith Croos and Nirupa (manageress), and another former Sri Lanka player Chathura Wickremasinghe will be the officials on the tour.
Nirupa thanked the parents for their commitment and support to help the Dribblers to come to this level.

The tour squad

Under 16 Boys Team: Naveen Arukgoda (Captain), Pushpika Mendis, Jason Weerasuriya, Rosh Koneri, Rolando Perera, Aminda Fernando, Avishka Fernando, Sachintha Weerasinghe, Rahul Rajendranath, Ravi Rajendranath, Hensel Moras, Senal Edirisinghe, Aman Khanna, Jude Bevan Perera

Under 12 Boys Team: Tharuka Arukgoda (Captain), Akindu Silva, Orlando Perera, Jaindu Lodiwycksz, Sharein Kenneth, Kaveen Heenatigala, Nimhan Diyagubadu, Onel Edirisinghe, Thenula Fernando, Thusara Vibhuthi, Ravindu Weerasinghe, Lashane Perera

Under 13 Girls team: Yannis Fernandes (Captain), Naduni Mendis, Tashya Croos, Deandra Perera, Akithma Silva, Sadini Silva, Nishiwa de Silva, Thesni Silva, Anandita Noronha, Ruwindi Samarakone, Nivedita Noronha
 

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