Seventeen year old Nethmi Fernando of Girl’s High School Kandy was crowned as the National Chess Champion in 2020.
Nethmi Fernando had her primary education at St. Anthony’s Girls’ College Katugastota. She started playing chess from grade 2 onwards in the school at her father s request. Her father played Chess at school level and he wanted his daughter Nethmi to play Chess. She learnt Chess from her coaches namely . Chanaka Saputhanthri, . Eriyagama, Niranga Kandearachchi and late . Haputhanthri. She passed the Grade 5 Scholarship exam in 2013.
Nethmi attended her new school Girls’ High School Kandy after her scholarship exam in 2014. She continued Chess in the new school. Nethmi learnt under new Chess coach Rajeendra Kalugampitiya from 2015. Kalugampitiya an experienced coach developed her Chess game day by day as a mentor, leader and a motivator.
Nethmi gave fine performances in the local individual and team tournaments in a few years. She won the 6th place of under 13 girl’s category in Sri Lanka Schools Chess tourney in 2016. She was placed second in the under 14 girl’s category of the National Youth Special Asian selection 2017. She was a member of the Women’s National Chess squad in 2017 and she was placed fifth in under 15 girl’s category in the Sri Lanka Schools Chess individuals.
She was runner up of the under 15 girl’s category in the National Youth Chess Championship in 2019 and she was 4th placed in the Women’s National ‘B’ Chess Championship in 2019.
She was placed fourth in the Women’s National ‘A’ Chess Championship in 2019 and she emerged champion of the National Youth Chess Championship in 2020. She was placed fourth in the Women’s National ‘B’ Chess Championship in 2020 and she emerged champion of the Women’s National ‘A’ Chess Championship conducted by Chess Federation of Sri Lanka in 2020.
She was a member of the Girl’s High School Kandy teams in the All Island School Games organized by the Ministry of Education. from 2016 to 2020. They emerged champions in the school level. She was a member of first runners up of Under 15 girl’s in 2016, second runners up Under 15 girl’s in 2017, first runners up of under 19 girl’s in 2018, Champions under 19 girl’s in 2019.
She was a member of the second runners up of Under 13 girl’s in 2014, first runners up of Under 15 girl’s in 2016, second runners up of Under 19 girl’s in 2018, first runners up of Under 19 girl’s in 2019 of the Sri Lanka Schools Chess Team championship.
She participated in the World School Chess Championship in Iran in 2016, and Asian School Chess Championship in Russia in 2016, and took part in the Asian Youth Chess Championship in Uzbekistan in 2017. She represented Sri Lanka in the World Schools Chess Championship at Albania in 2018. She emerged in many individual places in the Asian Schools Chess Championship. She was placed fifth of the Classical event of Under 15 girl’s, she was team runner up in the Rapid event, She represented Sri Lanka in the World Youth Chess Championship at India in 2019, and Sri Lanka in the West Asian Youth Chess Championship in 2019. She participated in the World online Olympia Chess team Championship and Nations Cup online team Chess Championship in 2020.
She has represented Sri Lanka many times in Asian and World Chess Championships and has toured five countries Iran, Russia, Uzbekistan, Albania and India
Nethmi passed GCE O/L with 8 A’s and B in English medium. She is studying inMaths stream for A/L in English Medium and will sit the A/L exam in 2022. She engaged in Scrabble as a sport in school.
Nethmi is grateful to Principal of Girls High School Kandy M. Abeygunasekara, chess teacher in charge of Mrs. H. Amunugama, Mrs. Anuradha Koswatte, Mrs. Indu Nagolla, school coach M.G.H.M. Farshan, former Chess coaches named Chanaka Saputhanthri, . Eriyagama, Niranga Kandearachchi and late . Haputhanthri, current coach Rajeendra Kalugampitiya, Luxman Wijesuriya president of CFSL and officials of Sri Lanka Schools Chess Association, (YK)
