CR, Kandy and CH register victories

Ranjeeva SENEVIRATNE

The reigning President’s Trophy champions CR and FC came up with a stupendous performance to beat Havelocks Sports Club by the staggering margin of 32 points to 5 at Havelock Park on Saturday.

After being contained to a 10-5 lead at the breather the Red shirts got their act together in the next 40 minutes to pile up 22 more points.

The CR forwards came up with a power-packed display to outplay the Havalocks ‘eight’ in the loose while the three quarters ran the ball at every opportunity which enabled them to cross the park club’s goal line on five occasions.

Flanker Pavithra Fernando was a source of inspiration to his team-mates with his fiery loose play and was ably supported by Danuskha Boteju, Anuja Perera, Dharmatilleke, Danushka Perera, Gayan Fernando and Diren Warnakulasuriya as the CR ‘eight’ reigned supreme in the loose.

In the line outs the CR duo of Gayan Fernando and Dharmatillke had the edge over Havelocks’ Kavinda Jaysena and Izzadeen while the set scrums were shared between CR’s Anuja Perera and Havelocks’ Rajiv Perera.

With the halves combination of Amjad Buksh and Ashan de Costa hitting it off smoothly CR ran the ball at every opportunity.

Centre Mohamed Sheriff who had an excellent game sliced through the Havalocks defence with his side-stepping and speed while winger Dinesh Kumara too tested the park club’s defence to the hilt with his powerful runs down the flank.

The park club contained the Red Shirts in the first half with some resolute tackling with flanker Sharo Fernando, fly helf Samantha Lakshan and centres Nuwan Samith and Zakir Badurdeen excelling with bone-crunching tackles which kept the CR ‘threes’ at bay in the first half.

Kandy fight back to beat Police

Defending champions Kandy Sports Club staged a superb fight-back to beat a gallant Police outfit by 29 points to 11 at Police Park on Sunday. The Police forwards came up with a courageous display to match up to the power-packed Kandy eight with Nishantha Welagedera, Nalin Archarige, Asela Vithana, Pradeep Wilson, Gonawela and skipper Nilusha Fernando giving of their best.

The Kandy three quarters too were kept in close check by the Police ‘threes’ in the first half with some fierce tackling.

The mighty Kandy SC came back storming in the last 20 minutes to pile up 24 points. Winger Sanjeeva Jayasinghe who had a marvellous game scored a hat-trick of tries while scrum half Saliya Kumara too stood out with a fine display of place kicking by firing across a penalty and adding the extra points to three tries including a spectacular conversion from near the corner flag.

Among the forwards skipper Sean Wijesinghe, Anuranga Walpola, Dilip Selvam, Imran Bisthamin and Jeewa Galgamuwa excelled with a tireless display in the loose.

CH move up to fourth position

CH and FC moved up to the fourth position in the points table with a smashing 40 points to 5 win over Sri Lanka Army at Police Park on Friday.

The lads from Maitland Crescent piled up 40 points in the first half itself crossing the goal line of the hapless soldiers on six occasions.

The Caltex ‘A’ division league points table
		P	W	L	D	T	C	P	DG	PF	PA	Pts
1. Kandy SC	10	10	0	0	75	45	4	0	480	93	44.50
2. CR and FC	10	8	1	1	51	22	8	1	326	116	38.50
3. Havelocks	10	7	3	0	38	24	15	1	286	158	29.50
4. CH and FC	10	4	5	1	45	19	10	1	296	184	20.50
5. Police SC	10	4	6	0	27	9	6	3	190	198	17.00
6. Army	10	2	8	0	24	10	8	0	164	357	9.00

Tabulated under: Played, Won, Lost, Drawn, Tries, Conversions, Penalties, Drop Goals, Points For, 
Points Against, Total Points.