The Lankans go down fighting to Japan, but a bronze is a possibility
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Sri Lanka will face group rivals South Korea in the Rugby Sevens Bronze medal playoff at the 18th Asian Games 2018 after Japan edged out the islanders 12-10 in the Gold medal semi-final at the GBK Rugby Field in Indonesia yesterday.
The Tuskers went out in full force for the first time with star player Danushka Ranjan making his first appearance in the competition in the crucial game against Japan. Sri Lanka made a solid start by opening scoring in the first minute through Kavindu Perera to take the lead 5-0, after Srinath Sooriyabandara failed to put over a difficult kick.
Japan playing rather cautiously capitalised, but were made to fight hard unlike their previous outings before Kosuke Hashino braced a try to level scores 5-5 in the third minute.
After a three-minute faceoff between the two sides, skipper Sudarshana Muthuthanthri made a breakthrough as he went on to score a brilliant try, which put Sooriyabandara in another challenge that failed. Muthuthanthri was replaced by Jason Dissanayake soon afterwards.
Sri Lanka led 10-5 for a considerable time just before Japan made a surprising move where Katsuyuki Sakai made the finishing touch. Sakai made the conversion to put Japan on the lead 12-10 just before halftime.
Sri Lanka made three quick changes after the first minute of the second half as Reeza Raffaideen, Tharinda Ratwatte and Rehan Silva replaced Kavindu Perera, Sudam Sooryarachchi and Gayan Weeraratne respectively as reinforcement, but still failed to make a break through. In the fourth minute Ranjan was taken off the field and replaced by Buddhima Piyarathe but both teams failed to overcome each other as the game ended with the scores of first half.
Sri Lanka will take on South Korea in the match for the Bronze medal as Japan will meet Hong Kong in the final which will determine the Gold and Silver medal winners.
On Friday, in the Gold medal quarter-final stage Sri Lanka beat China 17-12 to book their berth in the semi-final after two wins and a loss from Group ‘C’. Sri Lanka thrashed United Arab Emirates (68-0) before falling short narrowly against South Korea (26-31) on Thursday and went on to beat Afghanistan (36-0) on Friday morning to finish second in the group.