Sports -

“The refereeing was far below standard. We cannot win matches in Colombo this way,” breathed a hot St. Anthony’s coach Viper Gunaratne Jnr” reported in this same newspaper on 6th August. The report was of the match where St Anthony’s lost to Wesley College. The statement of Gunaratne would not have warranted comment if he only said the refereeing was far below standard. This would effect both teams and one could still win.

What is interesting is the second part of the statement “we cannot win matches in Colombo this way”. What is the real meaning of this? What other way can they resort to win matches. Is it that he expects that the schools from Kandy play in Kandy so that they could win matches? Or does he imply that the referee was biased to the Colombo School? The other possibility is that he expects a non Colombo referee for the Kandy school. This then is casting aspersions of the referees who are not from Colombo and is detrimental to the referees who come from Kandy. As most of the non Colombo referees at this level are from Kandy. Has Gunaratne thought of the possibility of his comments leading to a situation where schools from Colombo will also want to have their say when a non Colombo referee is appointed? The statement I suppose was made in the heat of the moment after the loss suffered.

However much one may want to ignore his comment there is a need to review in the light of the code of conduct. With standards of discipline deteriorating the comments need to be looked at by the authorities. Had the school, he coaches, won, would he have said the same thing? One thorny issue that was to the disliking of the coach was that the referee blew the flying wedge which is considered dangerous play. At school boy rugby there can be little room for this type of attack and the law is strong in preventing same.

According to Referee Nimal, Gunaratne was of the opinion that this is permissible. Nimal also confirmed that he had to warn Gunaratne for walking about in the playing enclosure without being seated in the technical area. There are always two sides to a story.

The school rugby season is gathering momentum and is to be one of interest with close contests and an even tussle for championship. In the “A” segment of division one there is only St. Peters who is unbeaten. Yet it does not mean that theirs will be a one horse race as the matches left for them are no pushovers. The Anthonians who beat Kingswood and Kingswood themselves are trailing close behind together with Wesley. However it seems that close contenders are the Anthonian side that has so far lost only one match. Wesley and Kingswood have lost a match each and have a draw playing each other.

There will also be a close wrestle between the teams at the bottom not to remain there as they run the risk of being dropped to segment B next year. Those at the bottom are Ananda College and S. Thomas’ College and Thurstan College. At present, with no wins, Thusrstan seem the more likely team to drop. S. Thomas’ with their win over Ananda have a better chance of staying in the “A” segment as they did last year.

A similar struggle is developing in segment ” B” of Division One and the front runners are expected to be among Trinity , Isipatana and Royal College. Here too there is a close fight among teams not be at the bottom of the barrel to avoid being demoted to the C group. The fight seems to be between St. Joseph’s, Vidyartha, Science and Dharmarajah.

It seems almost certain that Dharmaraja will find it difficult to stay in this segment. They have to forfeit points for one match. They have not been able to provide adequate security to match officials while being the hosts. Supporters who get motionally carried away and resort to cowardly acts of violence must note the damage they will cause to the side. The momentary satisfaction they get by having a fling will lead to greater losses. It is time the school authorities also extended the system to cover officials on the bench who are a part of the problem. This problem is more at school level.

The schools section has shown their strength in taking disciplinary action and handing out appropriate punishment. There are others who still are at large due to the lethargy of officials. There is also others that have not understood that their action, directly or indirectly, can cause their school to be penalized. They have to understand the hot stove principle. The iron when it is hot will burn irrespective of who touches it and whoever who touches it will get burnt.