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| Wednesday, 24 March 2004 |
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Dialog Division II Soccer Championship : St. Lucia's SC, Mannar rout Golden Star, Kandy Bernard Perera reporting from Mannar St. Lucia's Sports Club from Mannar created history on Saturday by winning the Dialog Division II Championship beating Golden Star SC, Kandy by four goals to nil. Lucia's SC who had the advantage in playing on their home town got off to a fine start attacking from the first blow. They kept pressure on visitors for over 20 minutes in the first session. During this period Kandy forwards never got the chance of moving closer to the goal line of their opponents. It was a session fully controlled by the Mannar teams defenders. However there were few occasions that Kandy lads came closer to banging a goal but these attempts were thwarted by the local custodian. In this half the home team missed two very close opportunities of scoring. If they slammed these two chances the score line would have been much bigger. Both teams returned to the pavilion after a hectic forty five minute battle minus any goals. After the return too it was the same dominance by the home team. But the visitors too fought hard to work the ball towards their opponents territory but failed to produce good results. Boys from Mannar had better ideas and moved the bull with long range kick coming from the half line. This ding dong battle went on for 21 minutes. S. K. Leslie Perera who received a good lob from left extreme made no mistake with his kick and put his side in front. It took further seven minutes for the local team to go further ahead with their skipper FA Figarado had a bang at the goal from 30 metres. The battle went on for ten more minutes and it was the skipper again who headed the third goal for his side. This put more pressure on the Kandy team and they were puzzled. Taking advantage of the situation striker Leslie Perera nestted in the fourth for his team four minutes later. Which also sealed victory for the Mannar's St. Lucia's SC team. FA Figarada skipper of the winning team a fisherman by profession was a happy man on this day along with his teams mates and officials. President of the St. Lucia's SC Anton Figarado said it was history for Mannar soccer. The boys played out everything they had to win this game. Full credit should go to the Mannar Football League for organising the Division two final on a grand scale said Chrysantha Perera CEO of FFSL. He said a special tribute also go to Golden SC for their willingness to play this game here, which served a gathering of over 10,000 soccer fans to witness a good game of soccer. Soccer fans in Mannar was well behaved and the side referees did not have any problems with the spectators-which proved that they were more interested in soccer. K. I. Dissanayake controlled the game well with assistance from Roshan Ranatunga and Athula Kalubowila. DIG Gamini Randeni President FFSL, V. Manilal Fernando Senior Vice President AFC, and M. T. Fernando Tournament Committee Chairman and many FFSl officials were present to witness the final. |
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