Vitha to coach Kingswood at rugby

By Shamseer Jaleel

Sri Lanka Sevens’ sensation and present champion Kandy Sports Club winger Chamara Vithanage will be the head coach of his alma mater Kingswood College at rugby in the year 2007. He will be taking over from Ronnie Ibrahim who had a grand stint with Kingswood. Ronnie coached his alma-mater for four years where the school had an outstanding record of 46 wins with only 2 defeats in the longer version of the game.

Chamara Vithanage in action….Kingswood new coach Vithanage (centre) is seen in action while representing Sri Lanka in their Singer International Rugby Sevens match played against Thailand.

Chamara Vithanage needs no introduction as he was judged as the Best Sportsman of Kingswood in the year 2000. After representing his school in Rugby Football, Chamara joined the Kandy Sports Club in 2000 and he was an automatic choice for the national sevens team from then onwards. He became a sevens specialist with some dashing runs down the wings and even his defence has been rock solid. He has toured Hong Kong, Thailand, Chinese Taipei, Australia and Kazakhastan.

In recent times he was selected as the Best Rugby player at the Caltex Inter Club season. In 2003 and 2004 he was selected as the Best Rugby Player at the Mercantile Rugby Sevens. Chamara has proved his ability as a player without any doubt within a shorter period of 6 years. All the rugby loving public will be eager to watch his coaching abilities. He will be under severe pressure to perform well as the expectation of their old boys will be very high with some outstaying rugby being dished out by Kingswood in the last 4-5 years. Also he will need to put one hundred percent to his club to keep his position safe as he will be a vital player under Jeeva Galgamuwa this year.