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by Chris Dhambarage

Wesley College will be hoping to regain the L. E. Blaze Shield after a lapse of six years when they take on traditional rivals Kingswood College Kandy in the first leg of their 18th annual inter school rugby encounter at the newly laid Randles Hill grounds, today.

The Wesleyites recorded their last win in the series way back in 1997 under the captaincy of Anupama Wadugodapitiya. But with a formidable outfit they now have a good chance of pulling off this game and maintain their unbeaten record in the Milo inter school season.

Wesley are vying for honours in the Milo 'A' division league tournament along with Isipatana, Royal, S. Thomas' College Mount Lavinia, Dharmaraja College Kandy, St. Anthony's and the defending Milo League champions St. Peter's College.

Last year they made a spectacular start to the season while recording stunning victories over the more fancied Trinity College (21-0), Dharmaraja College (33-0) and St. Anthony's College (12-8). They also stretched the strong Isipatana outfit to the maximum before going down fighting 3-6 in a thrilling encounter.

This year the team is captained by flanker Kasun de Silva and the other senior players are number eight Tyronne Harrison, Sri Lanka youth cap Zakir Badurdeen, second row forward Julian Francisco, wingers Naushiki Fariz, Saleem Buckman and Henry Terrence. The Kingswoodians will have the home advantage and will be determined to retain the Shield for another year. Last year the first leg ended in a six all draw but the second leg was not played due to unavoidable circumstances.

The Kingswoodians are of course competing in the Milo 'B' division league tournament along with Zahira, Kingswood, St. Sylvester's, Ananda, Thurstan, Vidyartha and St. Joseph's.

The teams:

Wesley: Dhanushka Warnasuriya, Kalid Sarfudeen, Ranga Saifa, Damith Perera, Hossein Tuan, Heshan Dissanayake, Dhanushka Ratnayake, Amila Subasinghe, Rukshan Omar and Omar Sarfudeen, Nuwan Samith, Zakir Badurdeen, Neranjan Wickremaratne, Yomal Amarathunga, Yasas Nonis.

Kingswood (from): D. Siriwimala (captain), Vinod Bandara, W. Nathavitharana, D. S. Ratnage, D. Premaratne, K. Ekanayake, P. M. Weerasekera, Achala Perera, A. Gunasekera, K. Abeygunaratne, E. Weerakkody, Faizal Marija, Mohamed Luthfi, N. Kaluarachchi, H. Permaratne, N. Wijethunga, Dinesh Kalpana, G. Noor, M. Jabbar, M. Akram.

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Copyright 2001 The Associated Newspapers of Ceylon Ltd.
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