The inaugural cricket encounter between Ananda and Nalanda was played in 1924 and the Captains of Ananda and Nalanda were A.P. Rajakaruna and B.S.Perera respectively.

See: The first ever group photo of the two teams in 1926

The match between the two schools was not played in 1943,1944 and 1945 due to the 2nd world war. The Maroons encounter was also not played in 1948, the year in which Sri Lanka gained independence. Because of these incidents some captains of the two schools were deprived of the honour of leading their teams in the Big Match.

Their names are as follows.

Throughout the long history of the Battle of the Maroons Ananda has emerged victorious on 12 occasions while Nalanda has recorded victories in 7 encounters.

The last victory in a Maroons Battle was recorded by Ananda at the Big Match in 2003 and for Nalanda the last victory was in 2022 after a lapse of sixty nine years.. These winning teams were led by Duminda Kularathne and Dinethe Samaraweera respectively.

By winning the Big Match during the years 1937, 1938,1939,1940 and 1941 Ananda established a record for the most consecutive victories in the history of the encounter. The captains who led the Ananda teams to victory during these 5 years were V.R.Perera , M.Sirimanne, J.D.Sugathadasa, G.W.Perera and M.A.Jayasinghe . Nalanda on the other hand has recorded successive wins only during the years 1949 and 1950. The victorious teams for Nalanda were led by M.A.L.Perera (1949) and A.W.Dharamadasa (1950).

It's with great pride we remember that Bandula became Sri Lanka's first test captain and Arjuna Ranatunga led the Sri Lanka team to victory at the 1996 cricket World Cup while the Sri Lanka team that became runners up at the 2007 World cup was led by Mahela Jayawardena.