Sports - Lions romp freely in Kandy

In one of the most looked forward to school confrontations the Trinitians outclassed the Thomians 12-0 in a game played under wet conditions in Kandy last week. The shield was first offered in 1978 in honour of Canon R S De Saram, a distinguished warden of St Thomas’ College Mount Lavinia. With this win the Trinitians lead the series 17 wins against 11 by the Thomians with one of the games ending in a tie.

Heavy showers just before the end and during the game made ground conditions wet and slippery as both teams found it difficult in handling the ball. These conditions suited the forwards play with Sean Wanigasekera and Rasantha Madawala having the better of the Thomian counterparts in the line outs. The scrums were equally shared.

The “Lions” opened scoring in the 21st minute of the game with scrum half Nishantha Manickam sending a short pass to centre Kosala Tissera who covered nearly 40 meters to go over the line. After the turn around the Thomians led by number 8 Yoshitha Rajapakse re grouped and played a better game having lot of territorial advantage but lacked the finishing touches. Yoshitha playing with only 2 of his coloursmens led from front but lacked support from the rest of the players. They missed out on some golden try scoring opportunities. The Thomian forwards had an outstanding game.

The score line stood 7-0 almost till the end of the game. In the dying stages of the match lock forward Rasantha Madawala who had a grand game crashed through the Thomian defence to plant a try. Though the Thomians kept on attacking during the last few minutes of the game they ran out of time.

Referee Priyantha Gunaratne
Trinity won the under 18 game 5-0
Winning start for Ananda

Ananda College opened the season with a bang when they outclassed St Joseph’s with an impressive 15-7 win at Havelock park in a friendly encounter. Ananda scored through three unconverted tries for which the Josephians replied through a penalty goal.

A win for Ananda is vital as they will find the going tough in the coming weeks when they meet the top sides in group A. The Ananda outfit is lead by the national youth skipper Gayan Fernando and once again coached by H Piyadasa.

Kingswood outclass Rajans
Kingswood College after their success against Trinity in their Centenary game had an outstanding performance when they thrashed their hometown rivals Dharmarajah 29-5 at the Bogambara Stadium.With this win they retained the William Weerasinghe memorial trophy for yet another year. The winners scored through 2 goals and three tries to Dharmarajah’s one try.Kingswood College led by Navin Wijetunge is being coached by Ronny Ibrahim who is enjoying some fine results in the last three years.

Antonians edge out St. Sylvester’s
Katugastota Antonians went through some anxious moments before edging out St Sylvester’s College 18-16 at Nittawela last week. The scores stood at 16-15 favouring the Kandy school. But the Antonians came back in the last minute of the game when they were on target with a 30-metre penalty to scrape through.

Peterites outclass Nalanda
St Peter’s College after being defeated by Royal last week came up with a better performance in the second half to trounce the Nalandians 44-0 after leading 10-0 at the short breather.

The Nalandians did well in the initial half to restrict the Peterites and they stopped most of the threatening moves by the home team. They cut loose in the second half and pounced holes in the tired Nalanda defence. Meedin who was in cracking form not only planting three tries but also as a reliable place kicker. Centre Gread Canute (3), Gayan Liyanage (1) and Sham Fernando also scored for the Bambalapitiya school.

The following are next week’s matches in Division A and B confirmed by the Sri Lanka Schools Rugby Football Association (SLSRFA)

Division A
Ananda vs Thurstan, Wesley vs Kingswood, St Peter’s vs St Thomas’

Division B
Dharmarajah vs Vidyartha, Royal vs Science, Isipathana vs St Joseph’s.