Tactful Royal record super win over Wesley
Denuja Samararatne, Royal's match-winner
In an equal battle of resilience, honour and grit, Royal College conquered over Wesley College by 21-16 as they comprehensively won their first Super Round game of the Dialog Schools Rugby League 2022 at Longdon Place yesterday.
In another way, the battle was visibly between Royal hooker Denuja Samararatne and Wesley flyhalf Shaveen Jayawardana, besides Royal fullback and placekicker Nabeel Yahiya. Despite solely scoring all of Wesley’s points, Jayawardana’s efforts was easily overshadowed by the famous ‘Royal Maul’ which resulting in Samararatne scoring a magnificent hat-trick of tries. Yahiya too stood out and was fully accurate in his three conversions, all coming from difficult angles.
Victors Royal scored from three converted tries despite trailing 7-9 at halftime, while Wesley’s points came from a converted try and three penalties, all solely coming off from Jayawardana.
The game got off to a solid start, with both teams attempting to barge into their opponent’s territory. Royal were surely flummoxed by Wesley who forced them to commit mistakes and concede penalties.
Flyhalf Jayawardana was spot on in three such occasions, in the 10th, 18th and 26th minutes, all from different, difficult and log ranges, as Wesley gradually increased their lead to 9-0 by the 27th minute.
Then came Royal’s trademark the Royal Maul in the 30th minute, also taking the desperate Wesley defenders along with them to give Samararatne his first brace on the left plank. With Yahiya’s perfect conversion, from the corner angle, Royal readily indicated where they are heading to as Wesley lead 9-7 at halftime. After the turnaround Wesley had to taste, what they fed to Royal in the first half, as the hosts were put in a desperate and defensive mode by the visitors. Royal succeeded to overpower their opponents in the 47th minute, once again from the same move giving Samararatne his second try and Yahiya his second consecutive kick to post. With that Royal took the lead for the first time 14-9, and continued their onslaught tactfully until Wesley were run down once against in the 65th minute in same fashion with the same pair of finishers.
After Samararatne completed his hat-trick of tries, Yahiya once again completed a hard conversion with ease to put Royal in a comfortable position and peerless position at 21-9.
But Wesley was not willing to give up, even during the dying stages and during extra time. For once they managed to breach the Royal defence and score a peach of a try after a neat backline work, as Jayawardana did the honours in touching down and converting the try just before the long whistle.