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The Ceylonese Rugby and Football Club kept their unbeaten record intact with a hard fought 25 points to 14 win over Sri Lanka Army on Friday at Longden Place.

It was the CR forwards who paved the way for this victory. Number eight Savantha de Saram gave a terrific display in the loose and proved to be a source of inspiration to his team-mates. With Viraj Prasantha, Sumadha Jayasinghe, Shantha Rohana, Pavithra Fernando and Shamly Nawaz also giving a fiery display the 'Red Shirts' eight outplayed their famed counterparts in the loose.

But the Red Shirts three-quarters could not make much headway as the two centres Kaluarachchi and Abeygunawardena were at the receiving end of some fierce tackling by their opposite numbers Vajira Jayatilleke and Ranga Perera. Even Roshan Peiris attempts to gain territorial advantage with his long kicks did not pay dividends with Army's full-back T. A. Silva giving a superb display with his safe collections and booming kicks to touch.

With skipper Ajith Peiris leaving the field midway in the first- half Kapila Knowlton moved to the pivotal fly-half berth and set the three-quarters in motion at every turn which resulted in centre Vajira Jayatilleke and winger Sithara Fernando piercing the CR defence on several occasions before they were brought down in the nick of time by desperate tackles by CR defenders.

Among the Army forwards Herathge Karunaratne and Nishantha Jayasuriya stood out in both attack and defence but lacked support from the rest of the forwards.

Kandy rout Havies

Defending champions Kandy Sports Club turned in a power-backed display to score a runaway 56-13 win over Havelocks at Nittawela on Sunday.

The forwards came up with a power-packed display in the loose with Harris Omar, Asoka Jayasena, Mohamed Buksh, Chaminda Yapa, Jeewa Galgamuwa and skipper Pradeep Basnayake giving of their best. They also had a large share of possession from the set scrums and line outs with Mohamed Bukch outhooking Duminda Pushpakumara in the set-scrums while Jayasena and Bandaranayake towered above the rest in the line outs.

But the Kandy three-quarters could not make maximum use of the 'good ball' that came their way due to poor ball handling as they 'knocked on' at crucial moments which prevented them from winning by a bigger margin.

Winger Indrajith Bandaranayake scored two superb tries. Another player who stood out was substitute scrum-half Dilip Selvam who made a break and ran 60 metres before he was brought down and No. 8 Harris Omar who was backing up picked up the ball and scored.

Navy move up to sixth place

The Sri Lanka Navy moved up to sixth position in the points table with a convincing 44-13 win over Kandy Youths while the Airmen edged out Old Zahirians by 12-10 at Longden Place on Sunday.

Police crush Galle RFC

The vastly improved Policemen went on the rampage at Koggala on Saturday to rout Galle RFC by the staggering margin of 101 points to 6. The policemen crossed the opponents goal-line on 13 occasions to register the second highest score of the season. 

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