The Henry Steel Olcott Memorial Cricket Tournament is conducted annually among the past cricketers of eight premier Buddhist schools in Sri Lanka in honour of Col. Olcott, the founder of Buddhist education in Sri Lanka. The organizing function in each year is rotated among each participating Old Boy Associations [1]
Beginning
This cricket tournament was started in 1999 following the 75th Anniversary Celebrations of Nalanda College Colombo. About this time, groups Old Boys of Nalanda, Dharmaraja and Ananda were meeting informally in the evenings at the Bloomfield Cricket Club. It was during one of these gatherings that the idea of a limited over tournament among the Old Boys of the cricket-playing Buddhist Schools was proposed by the 1st Test Captain of Sri Lanka, Bandula Warnapura of Nalanda. Accordingly, the first tournament of the series was held by the Old Nalandian Sports Club on 12 December 1999 at the Nalanda College Grounds.[2]
