Kandy remain unbeaten by edging out CR

Ranjeeva SENEVIRATNE

Defending champions Kandy Sports Club withstood a fierce challenge from a gallant CR and FC outfit at Nittawela on Sunday to win by 18 points to 15 and keep their unbeaten record intact.

The lads from Kandy dominated the first half and took a 15-5 lead through tries by scrum half Saliya Kumara and centre Sajith Mallikarachchi and a penalty fired across by Saliya Kumara.

But the Red Shirts came back storming in the second half through their power-packed forwards and scored two splendid tries through No. 8 Dushanth Lewke and hooker Anuja Perera to make it 15-all before Kandy scrum half Saliya Kumara fired across a 25 metre penalty four minutes before the final whistle.

The Red Shirts launched an all out assault on the Kandy goal line in the last few minutes and were a few metres away from the goal line when referee James Fitzgerald blew the final whistle much to the relief of the Kandy team giving them a thrilling win.

It was Kandy’s speedy three quarters who paved the way for this victory. The halves combination of Saliya Kumara and Fazil Marija hit it off smoothly while centres Pradeep Liyanage and Sajith Mallikarachchi sliced through the CR defence with their probing runs while winger Sanjeeva Jayasinghe made some daring runs down the flank before he was brought down in the nick of time by a desperate CR defence.

Sri Lanka scrum half Saliya Kumara was Kandy’s hero. He scored a superb try, added the extra points to the other try scored by Mallikarachchi and fired across two penalties which gave him a personal tally of 13 points.

Havelocks Sports Club helped by a superb display of place kicking by last year’s Dharmaraja and Sri Lanka under 20 full back Nuwan Hettiarachchi scored a hard fought 19-11 win over CH and FC at Havelock Park on the same day.

He fired across four penalties including one from 40 metres out and made a spectacular conversion to the corner flag try scored by Zakir Badurdeen to contribute 14 points.

The park club’s forwards too played a key role in their success with a fiery display in the loose to outplay their counterparts with Shafi Hassan, Rajiv Perera, Mohamed Izzadeen, Rajiv Ganapathy, Ravi Jayasuriya and Sharo Fernando giving of their best.

The CH and FC three quarters could not make much headway with fly half Sajith Bandara being constantly ‘nailed’ by the Havelocks flankers Ravi Jayasuriya and Sharo Fernando which crippled their three quarter moves and resulted in the Maitland Crescent Club suffering their third successive defeat.

The Sri Lanka Police propelled by a power-packed display by their forwards scored a convincing 22-6 win over Sri Lanka Army to register their fourth victory for the season.

The policemen after being contained to a 8-3 lead at the breather dominated the second half to add 14 more points.

Flanker Gemunu Indrachapa, lock forward Pradeep Wilson and flanker Nilusha Fernando scored the tries for Police with fly half Harshana Wijeweera converting two tries and putting over a penalty to give them a morale-boosting win.

The Sri Lanka Air Force notched up their first win for the season by beating the minnows of ‘A’ Division rugby Old Zahirians by 26-5 at Ratmalana on Friday helped by tries from prop forward Kosala Ranasinghe, scrum half Radeesha Seneviratne, centre Charith Seneviratne and fly half Chanaka Chandimal.