Ian Healy to Arjuna Ranatunga: “You don’t get a runner for being overweight, unfit, fat c**t!”

The Australians never lost an opportunity to get under Ranatunga’s skin.

Arjuna Ranatunga had an enduring hate against the Australians. And the Aussies hated his guts. He vociferously defended Muttiah Muralitharan after the spinner was called for throwing in a Test match in Australia, and took his team off the field, threatening to concede the match. Ranatunga could not stand Shane Warne and rubbished him an ordinary spinner.

Warne wrote in his 2008 book Shane Warne’s Century, “You can’t be mates with everyone. If there was any way I could knock him down to number 101 for the purposes of this book, I’d be delighted to do so. But having taken on the task, I want to do it seriously, and the fact is that Ranatunga helped to put Sri Lanka on the cricket map. And you know what? Deep down, I’ll quietly admit that I rated him as a cricketer.”

The Australians never lost an opportunity to get under Ranatunga’s skin. And one of the protagonists in dealing with the Sri Lankan captain was Ian Healy. On January 20, 1996, Sri Lanka were playing Australia in the Benson & Hedges World Series final. Australia had scored 273 in their 50 overs. A deluge truncated the match and Sri Lankan were left with a target of 168 in 25 overs.

The match was played in extremely humid conditions at the Sydney Cricket Ground and Ranatunga, not the fittest of players in international cricket, suffered a sprained ankle. He summoned for a runner, but Healy slammed him from behind the wickets: “You don’t get a runner for being overweight, unfit fat c**t!”

Though umpire Steve Randall turned down Ranatunga’s request, he allowed Sanath Jayasuriya to act as a runner an over later. Ranatunga’s efforts went in vain as Sri Lanka lost by nine runs.