Thousands Of Protesters Surround Stadium In Sri Lanka During Cricket Match Against Australia

Thousands of anti-government protesters demonstrated outside a stadium in Sri Lanka’s southern coastal city of Galle during the country’s Test cricket match against Australia, the world’s No. 1 ranked team, on Saturday.
Local media showed videos of large crowds protesting against the government outside the Galle International Stadium, which is about a two-hour drive from Colombo. They waved Sri Lankan flags and carried banners with signs reading ‘Power to the people’ and ‘GotaGoHome’ – demanding that President Gotabaya Rajapaksa step down over his handling of the country’s dire economic crisis. Many protesters then defied a police ban to march to the top of a fort overlooking the stadium site, where they continued to hold banners and shout their demands.
However, the protests did not stop the game.
Australian cricket commentator Adam Collins, reporting from the stadium, described “excellent scenes in Galle”. “Protesters on cranes, others in the back of trucks – it’s intense out there now, louder than ever and not going anywhere,” he said on Twitter, describing what it looked like outside the stadium.
Amid economic turmoil and widespread protests in the island nation, the Australian cricket team arrived in Sri Lanka in the first week of June to play two Tests, five Internationals (ODIs) and three Twenty20 Internationals (T20Is) against the Lions. “We’re watching closely, it’s something we’ve talked about in our team meetings as well,” Australian captain Pat Cummins told reporters last week.
“We are so lucky to come here and experience Sri Lanka quite normally. We’re definitely seeing the results, even on the buses that see kilometers of queues around petrol stations, so that’s fine with us. Whatever the outcome, we are in a truly privileged position. There are a lot of people who do this to play some cricket,” he added.
On Friday, Cummins tweeted: “Sri Lanka is facing its worst humanitarian crisis in decades,” and shared a video where he sat down with two local Sri Lankans to talk about their experience and what’s happening on the ground. He also shared a UNICEF link and asked people to support Sri Lankan children affected by the economic crisis.