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Sri Lanka hope home soil can tilt World Cup scales
Sunday Island
|February 01, 2026
With another home World Cup less than ten days away, the drums are already rolling across the island and the mood is unmistakably festive.
Dasun Shanaka and Matheesha Pathirana pose with the World Cup trophy.
Sri Lanka have been down this road before. In 2011 and 2012, the country staged back-to-back global events that were box-office successes, finals appearances for the home side and the unveiling of three new stadiums with capacities north of 30,000, even if Hambantota later came to be labelled, rather unkindly, a white elephant.
Ticket frenzies during those tournaments prompted Sri Lanka Cricket to float an ambitious 60,000-seat stadium at Diyagama, a plan that was eventually bowled out amid protests from former players. Yet, stripped of sentiment, the logic remains hard to dispute. Demand, especially for marquee clashes like India versus Pakistan, continues to be off the charts.
This story is from the February 01, 2026 edition of Sunday Island.
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