Queen will miss Commonwealth Games opening ceremony

Minister of Sports Roshan Ranasinghe greeting the Sri Lankan Commonwealth Games contingent before their departure to Birmingham    

By Susil Premalal - Reporting from Birmingham

The Queen will not be attending the 22nd Commonwealth Games opening ceremony in Birmingham, England today, Buckingham Palace confirmed yesterday.  

However, Prince Charles will help to kick-off the biggest multi-sports event in the United Kingdom since the London Olympic Games in 2012.  

Charles will be joined by the Duchess of Cornwall, and will deliver a speech at today’s opening ceremony.  
A total of 5054 athletes from 72 Commonwealth member countries will compete in 20 different sports disciplines in this year’s showpiece event, which was first held in 1930 in Canada.  

This is the third time that England is hosting the Commonwealth Games having earlier organised the event in 1934 (London) and in 2002 (Manchester).  

Meanwhile, Sri Lanka with a 110-member strong team, are among the top ten countries with the largest contingent of athletes as they join some of the biggest sporting nations including hosts England (440), Australia (434), Canada (273), Scotland (254), South Africa (239), New Zealand (234), India (217) and Kenya (123).   
Sri Lanka will participate in 14 sports disciplines including track and field, swimming, badminton, 3X3 basketball, beach volleyball, boxing, T20 cricket, judo, Para-athletics, rugby sevens, squash, weightlifting, wrestling and gymnastics.   

Initially, Sri Lanka were also planning to participate in table tennis events but had to withdraw from the Games due to non-availability of two of their key players,  

The Team Leader of the Sri Lankan contingent will be Indika Dissanayake, who won a weightlifting Silver Medal in Gold Coast in 2018 while 2021 Tokyo Olympics gymnast Milka De Silva will be the Women’s Captain.  

Sri Lankan Medals

Sri Lanka has won a total of 20 medals in the Commonwealth Games history from 1938 to 2018, including four Gold Medals, eight Silver Medals and eight Bronze Medals.Boxer Barney Henricus had the honour of winning Sri Lanka’s first Commonwealth Games medal when he won the Gold in the 57kg weight class at the 1938 Sydney Games.  

Thereafter, Duncan White won the Gold Medal in the Men’s 440 yards hurdles event at the 1950 Auckland Games while Pushpamali Ramanayake and Mali Wickremasinghe won Gold Medals in Women’s rifle shooting at the 1994 Victoria Games.  

Weightlifter Chinthana Vidanage won Sri Lanka’s last Commonwealth Games Gold Medal in Melbourne, 2006.   
At the 2018 Gold Coast Games, Sri Lanka won a Silver Medal and two Bronze Medals in weightlifting and three Bronze Medals in boxing with Dissanayake securing the solitary Silver Medal in weightlifting.   

This time Sri Lanka are targeting at least four to six medals especially in weightlifting, wrestling, gymnastics, track and field, T20 cricket and judo.