History of the Sri Lankan cricket team the long voyage to each other's country. Douglas Jardine's infamous "bodyline team" was there in 1932–33. Occasionally, teams representative of Ceylon played matches abroad, especially in India. English team Sir Julien Cahn's XI visited Ceylon in 1936–37. The India national cricket team visited Ceylon in April 1945 and played one first-class match against Ceylon at the Paikiasothy Saravanamuttu Stadium in Colombo. The match was drawn on account of bad weather. India's team was a strong one captained by Vijay Merchant and including notable players such as Shute Banerjee, Mushtaq Ali, Lala Amarnath, Vijay Hazare and Rusi Modi. Several Australian teams
The Ashes the notable absence of Larwood, Voce and Jardine. The MCC had made it clear, in light of the revelations of the bodyline series, that these players would not face Australia. The MCC, although it had earlier condoned and encouraged bodyline tactics in the 1932–33 series, laid the blame on Larwood when relations turned sour. Larwood was forced by the MCC to either apologise or be removed from the Test side. He went for the latter. Australia recovered the Ashes in 1934 and held them until 1953, though no Test cricket was played during the Second World War. As in 1930,