A close for CR; but close the tourney at third place
View(s):As the final week of the Dialog Division ‘A’ Inter-Club League Tournament reached an end, CR and FC escaped from the jaws of defeat before scraping through to a thrilling 19-17 victory against a spirited Air Force team at Longdon Place yesterday.
The win assures Red Shirts the third place in the league standings as they went on to score from two unconverted tries and three penalties, while holding on to a slender 11-10 lead at halftime. The Airmen were whiskers behind CR all the while but they had to contend with two converted tries and a penalty.
A narrow defeat for the Airmen but the poor play could be attributed to the fact that most of the CR’s starting lineup were missing in action. Regular starters Ishan Noor, Sashan Mohammed, Arun Kumar, Bhanuka Nanayakkara, Taariq Salih and Ashan de Costa took with most of them sustaining minor injuries, and with the Clifford Cup Knockout Tournament around the corner they could have used the phase to reboot and rejuvenate.
Despite CR leading by one point at halftime 11-10, it was still Air Force who impressed on the field with their speedy centre Charith Seneviratne, who was the architect for the points they earned. Seneviratne was responsible for creating the play for a try earlier in the game, a try, two conversions and a penalty, taking his personal tally to 12 points from Air Force’s total.
CR drew first blood five minutes into play and crashed through the Air Force barricade to score an unconverted try.
The Airmen retaliated and gained dangerous yards and had most of the possession during the first half as they successfully secured a penalty through their playmaker Seneviratne. CR managed to gain possession and was deep in their 25metre line when Seneviratne intercepted and dashed across the field to pass it on to his scrum-half Ranjan Baddegama, who scored on the left side of the post. With Seneviratna’s conversion Air Force took a clear lead by 10-5 over the home team. But CR thwarted all further efforts by their rivals and managed to lead at half time by one point with fullback Prince Chamara coming to the rescue, putting over two penalties .
After the resumption the Air Force jets were probably running out of fuel giving way for CR to capitalise. On this opportunity CR asserted their dominance and scored an unconverted try through flanker Jeson Dissanayake as they mockingly extended the lead through a penalty off the boots of Chamara. When all seemed lost for the Airmen in the dying stages of the game Seneviratne scored a beautiful crafted try, hitting a gap and slipping right through the CR defence and went on to successfully convert it as they fell two points behind CR before at the long whistle.