Marvan Atapattu Sidath Wettimuny, Thilan Samaraweera, Dinesh Chandimal and Thilina Kandamby are among the players to pass out from Ananda College.

That Indian team featured the likes of Ravi Shastri, Lalchand Rajput, Sadanand Vishwanath, Chandrakant Pandit, Laxman Sivaramakrishnan and Bharat Arun.

He also shared a 99 run partnership with Ranjan Madugalle for the fourth wicket in Sri Lanka's inaugural test match.

[27] He along with Asanka Gurusinha became the first pair of Sri Lankan batters to bat out the entire day of a test match for Sri Lanka with an unbroken partnership of 240 runs on a wicketless final day of the match against Pakistan at the P. Sara Oval in 1986 which also eventually led to a draw.

[28] Both came on to bat on a decisive fourth day of the test match when Sri Lanka was reeling at 83/3 and the duo endured resistance against the Pakistani bowling attack with the likes of Imran Khan, Abdul Qadir and Wasim Akram.

He was a key member of the Sri Lankan side which won its maiden Asia Cup title in 1986.

[33][34] His innovative captaincy took a Sri Lanka team, given little chance prior to the competition, for cricket's greatest prize.

While Ranatunga scored 241 runs during Sri Lanka's 1996 World Cup winning campaign, he finished with the highest average in the tournament.

[56] Ranatunga was known for controversially calling a runner during long innings due to his level of fitness and also he had reportedly twisted his ankle.

[64] In a comment caught on the stump microphone he was heard to say to Ranatunga "Your conduct today has been appalling for a country's captain".

When the former visited Sri Lanka in the aftermath of the 2004 tsunami to aid Muralitharan in his "great work"[66][67][68] there, he developed an amiable rapport with his long-time foe: "We even wagged," he confirmed later.

"[66] Following Warne's death in 2022, Ranatunga wrote "...Shane and I had a very confrontational and competitive relationship on the field, but we also had immense mutual respect for each other.

"[74][75] During the tenure as the chairman of Sri Lanka Cricket, he termed the Indian franchise T20 league Indian Premier League as "instant noodles" when it was introduced in 2008 and also blamed the IPL for causing severe financial losses to the cricket board due to the postponement of England's scheduled tour to Sri Lanka.

[78][79] In July 2017, Ranatunga made a serious allegation that the 2011 Cricket World Cup Final match between India and Sri Lanka was fixed.

[81] The erstwhile Sports Minister of Sri Lanka Mahindananda Aluthgamage also supported Ranatunga's allegations.

[82] However, three years later, Sri Lankan Police suspended the match fixing probe citing lack of sufficient evidence.

[84] In 2018, former Sri Lanka Cricket President Thilanga Sumathipala alleged both Arjuna and Aravinda de Silva to have involved in match fixing in 1994 and insisted that both of them had received money from Indian bookies.

[94][95] In a television interview as of June 2021, he made a controversial statement that Sri Lanka cricket officials arranged the bilateral limited overs series against second string Indian side with the intention of gaining revenue through television marketing and also further insisted that arranging international series against second string India team has undermined dignity of the legacy of Sri Lanka cricket and therefore would insult the Sri Lankan cricket.

[96][97] In addition, he also made another controversial statement that he would give three slaps to the current crop of national cricketers in wake of the disciplinary violations regarding the breach of bio-secure bubble by three of the Sri Lankan cricketers during the limited overs series tour of England.

[99][100] He entered into politics by joining the Sri Lanka Freedom Party led by Chandrika Kumaratunga, and contested the 2001 parliamentary elections with PA from Colombo District.

[102][103] In 2006, he resigned from the post of junior minister tourism in order to concentrate on Sri Lanka Cricket administration.

[102][112] In 2020, he was deemed as a possible candidate to replace Ranil Wickremasinghe as the leader of the United National Party who had resigned from the position in wake of the defeat at the parliamentary elections.