News has been received of the passing away of former Wesley College Principal Dr. Lou Adhihetty, in Switzerland.

Dr. Adhihetty was Principal of Wesley from 1985-1988.

He was a wizard at sports. He captained the Wesley cricket team in 1955 and 1956 and also the hockey, athletics and soccer teams.

Together with Bryan Claessen he held the record of having scored the highest number of centuries, namely four, until it was broken by Dhanesh Dissanayake in 1989 when he scored 5. To set the record straight, in 1991, Roshan David equaled 5 centuries. However it is Darshika Jayakody who holds the record of scoring 8 centuries, which he completed in 1998.

While at Cambridge University, Lou obtained his Hockey Blue, being the first Sri Lankan to do so. While at Cambridge, Lou met his partner in life, Lisbeth. She was a tower of strength to Lou.

While at Wesley, Lou taught German and English. Lou had two brothers, Vincent and Arnold. The latter captained Richmond in 1947, while the former, Vincent, was a useful cricketer, who was popularly known, even by the Principal Cedric Orloff, as ‘Gal Thoppi.’ Lou’s sister Malini was also an outstanding athlete at Methodist College.

The Adhihetty family was well known to me. I can quote several interesting incidents, but this is not the occasion! Bertie Adhihetty was Superintendent of Prisons, and when he served in Jaffna, the numerous anecdotes connected, make very interesting reading.

In a way, Lou’s rise to stardom happened quite accidentally. The final senior House cricket match was played on the Prison Grounds, bordering where Lou lived. In my capacity as captain, I asked Lou, then only 12, to don pads and proceed to bat as last man. He clobbered the bowling, and we won comfortably.