Durraippa Stadium in Jaffna witnessed highly fought two semi-finals of the Kotmale Under-19 Schools Football Championship on Thursday (3) under lights.
This is the first time a competition is hosted in Jaffna under flood light as the initiative came from the Football Federation of Sri Lanka (FFSL).
The first semi-final between Jaffna St.Patrick College and Wennappuwa Josheph Vaz College came as a thriller till the last minute with no scores from both sides.
However, both teams displayed high quality skills in controlling the play and creating scoring opportunities.
At final whistle, both teams entered in to a draw with no scores and the referee decided to go for the penalty shoots to determine the winner as per the tournament regulation.
In a very close fight between the two, the host city school, St. Patrick emerged winners with 6-5 scores and advanced to the grand final on Saturday (5) at Durraiappa Stadium.
The second semi-final was even more thriller between Jaffna St. Henry’s College and Colombo Zahira College.
This turned out to be the fantastic soccer entertainment for the over 4000 spectators including mothers carrying their kids.
Striker Mathusan opened the score for St. Henry’s at the 40th minute and lead the game to 1-0 till the halftime.
Zahira did not find any breakthrough in the first half.
The second half took a new turn with Zahira dominated the attack and Mohamed Akib found the nets for Zahira at 60th minute.
The game was highly tensed with both teams played a sensitive attacking football.
In the dying minutes of the game, 90+1 minute P. Krishanth of St. Henry’s scored the second the goal and gave hope for the home team of victory celebrations.
However, Zahira Coach Mohamed Roomy did not bow to the home team’s challenges and soon made some tactical changes with formation and equalized the score through M.A. Saheel at the 90+3 minute.
At final whistle, the score remained 2-2 for both teams.
Penalty shootouts to determine the winner was nail biting moments for football fans.
None could have predicted the winner till the last kick.
Finally, with a fantastic display, Zahira took the lead to 6-3 and advanced to the final.
The 3rd Place match and the grand final will be played at Durraippa Stadium at 5.00pm and 7.00pm respectively.
FFSL is taking the game to different parts of the country with more glamour as part of its vision to make football as the most popular sport by the year 2022.
The Under-19 School Championship in Jaffna is a great milestone with huge attendance of fans and the final on Saturday (5) is expected to see a large fan base both from North and Colombo.
Fixtures
3rd Place: Joseph Vaz vsSt. Henry’s at 5.00pm
Final: St. Patrick vs Zahira Colombo at 7.00pm
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