Senul Ratnayake a 12-year-old student of Dharmaraja College has made his school, Kandy and the country proud by being selected for the ITTF World Hopes Table Tennis Challenge week to be held in Jordan in December 2021.
Only 20 boys qualified from 20 countries where four Asians were selected for this prestigious event. Ratnayake collected 13 points to qualify from the ITTF World Junior Ranking Table Tennis Tournament that took place on Oman in October. He finished the 67th ranked player in the under-13 category. His aim is to play in another couple of world ranking tournaments and be promoted to one of the top 10 under-13 players.
Ratnayake reached the main draw in the U-15 category by playing five sets in round 32 in Oman. He has also represented the Sri Lanka junior team as the youngest player in this tournament and the country at the World Hopes and Challenge Table Tennis Program 2021 as the under-12 ranking number one player in the island.
He also became the under-11 ranking number one player of Sri Lanka in 2020 and has also won the championship in the under-10 age group of the All Island Ranking Tibhar Table Tennis Tournament in 2019.
He became the runner-up in the under-12 category at the All-Island Novices Friendship Table Tennis Tournament in 2019.
The talented Ratnayake was presented the prestigious Maroons award at the Colours Nite of Dharmaraja College in 2018 and 2019.