Kandy fail to impress in facile win
- Pic by Ranjith Perera
Kandy SC must surely have disappointed their many supporters by their slightly lackadaisical display (especially in the second half), though winning over the Police by 34 points (4 goals, 2 penalties) to 23 (1 goal, 2 tries, 2 penalties) at Police Park.
Kandy dominated the lines out through the efforts of Shehan Pathirana and Suhiru Anthony. Their good work was capitalised on by the back division which spun out some good moves. They led 31-8 at the break, but what followed was a bit if a disaster, as the champions were only able to add a mere penalty in the second half. In that time, their opponents added a further 15 points.
Police were not fazed by the Kandy team and, on a few occasions, they were able to pierce the defence, full back Rajith Sansoni was not accurate enough with his conversions and this cost the law enforcers a few valuable points.
Police hinted at what was to come by conjuring up a try in the third minute. Scrum half Janith Chaturanga broke away from a scrum and fed winger Mohamed Absal. The move ended with centre Mushin Faleel touching down for an unconverted try.
Lock Dimitri Wijetunga scored Kandy’s first try when he bulldozed his way through, a short distance and scored Wijesinghe, who had a good game, made no mistake with the conversion. He followed this up with a penalty for the winners to stay ahead 10-5.
The Police backs then started attacking the Kandy line. A grubber or two was attempted to put the defence under pressure. Kandy conceded a penalty at this stage (10-8).
The narrow lead was short-lived. Fazil Marija, restored to fly half, kicked a deep grubber. Kandy’s backs ran this way and that before Pathirana went over Thilina converted (17-8). Danushka Dayan, the winger, was over next and Wijesinghe added the points (24-8) Srinath Sooriyabandara, given a start for once, picked up and went over for Kandy’s last try. It was a brilliant piece of opportunism (31-8).
Just before lemons, Sansoni’s attempt at a 35-yard yard penalty skimmed under the bar.  
Unbelievably, Kandy failed to touch down after the break. Sansoni added the points off a penalty to increase their score to 31-11. This was cancelled out, however, by a Wijesinghe penalty (34-11)
Riza Reffaideen charged down an attempted clearance by a Kandy player around the half way mark, and went through untouched for an under the posts try. The conversion increased Police’s tally to 18.
Just before full time, lock Romesh Acharige went over off a short top, but Sansoni failed to add the extra points.
Kandy won with a bonus point, but this performance was a far cry from some of their more recent ones. True enough, they were without skipper Roshan Weeraratne, Richard Dharmapala and Buvaneka Udangamuwe. However, with a bench strength comprising some Sri Lanka players, the second half performance was intensely disappointing.
Referee Irshad Cader  Â