Rugby Asiad squad pruned

The final Rugby Asiad is less than a month away and the Lankan team is hard at practice and fitness training. Ten countries have confirmed their participation at this seven day rugby extravaganza which begins on November 3 at CR and FC and the Royal College Sports Complex grounds.

The countries that have confirmed their participation are Kazakhstan, hosts Sri Lanka, China, Chinese Taipei, Thailand, Malaysia, India, Pakistan, Iran and Qatar.

Rob Yule is the coach and S.W. Chang is the manager. Incidentally we are hoping to pick the Under 20 squad for the Youth Asiad some time this week.”

One feature of the 37 member squad is the inclusion of two sets of brothers in Radhika and Avantha Hettiarachchi and Lasantha and Ashen Costa.

The squad of 49 was pruned down to 37 players following a selection committee meeting held on Friday.

The names of the final 37 are as follows:: 1. J. Galgamuwa, 2. N. Meepage, 3. K. Jehan, 4. J. Ranaweera, 5. S. Mohamed, 6. A. Walpola, 7. Achala Perera, 8. Sendil Kumar, 9. T. Henry, 10. S. Bandara, 11. D. Sanjeewa, 12. Sumedha Jayasinghe, 13 I. Bistamin, 14. K. De Silva, 15. R. Jayasuriya, 16. S. Wijesinghe, 17. A. Karthelis, 18. D. Lewke, 19. S. Malawana, 20. Z. Jhan, 21 A. Buksh, 22. T. Shamrock, 23. Saliya Kumara, 24. F. Marija, 25. A. Costa, 26 A. Hettiarachchi, 27. N. Karunanayake, 28. L. Costa, 29. P. Liyanage, 30.. Sanjeewa Jayasinghe, 31 Dinesh Kumara, 32. L. Perera, 33. D. Chaturanga, 34. M. Jabbar, 35. R. Hettirachchi, 36. D. Wijeratne and 37. Dilip Selvam (to be included from out of the original 49) -HJ