CH-Police clash pick of the quarter-finals

Ranjeeva SENEVIRATNE

The confrontation between the Colombo Hockey and Football Club and Police Sports Club on August 9 at Police Park is the pick of the four quarter-finals of the Caltex Inter-club knock-out tournament for the Clifford Cup which will be worked off from August 8 to 24.

The policemen won the first round game by 12-11 at Police Park while CH and FC won the return match by 18-12 at Maitland Crescent in the Caltex 'A' Division League and the battle between these two evenly matched teams should turn out to be a thriller.

CH and FC which finished fourth finished the 'A' Division League on a high note with three smashing wins over Army (40-5), Police (18-12) and Havelocks (29-10).

The forte of the CH and FC are their power-packed forwards and the pack was further strengthened with the inclusion of Sri Lanka Youth Players Sajith Suranga and Bilal Hassen while the three quarters also showed marked improvement with fly half Omar Hassen and full back Milinda Jayasinghe giving a fine display.

In the last game against Havelocks Hassen gave them territorial advantage with long kicks to touch and also brought down the opponents with some bone-crunching tackles

while Jayasinghe was a tower of strength in the last line of defence with his safe collections and booming kicks to touch in addition to joining the line to form the overlap.

The Police three quarters too gave a much better display in the last four matches. The shifting of Danushka Pubudu to the fly half berth and moving of Harshana Wijeweera to the centre position paid rich dividends.

The halves combination of Milinda Bandara and Danushka Pubudu hit it off smoothly while centres Wijeweera and Chula Susantha combined effectively to breach the opponents defence on several occasions.

With lock forward Pradeep Wilson moving to the No. 8 berth the Policemen won more possession having three jumpers in the line outs.

The Policemen went down fighting (20-22) to the formidable CR and FC and were leading 11-5 against the mighty Kandy SC till the 20th minute of the second half before losing 11-29 and scored a morale-boosting 21-17 win over Army.

Defending champions Kandy SC should have it easy against Galle RFC in their quarter-final at Nittawala on August 9 White League runners up CR and FC have the edge over Air Force in their quarter-final clash on August 8 at Police Park

while Havelocks should have it easy against Army in the fourth quarter-final at Police Park on August 10.

The schedule: Quarter-Finals:

(a) CR and FC vs Air Force on August 8 at Police Park
(b) Kandy SC vs Galle RFC on August 9 at Nittawala
(C) Ch and FC vs Police on August 9 at Police Park
(d) Havelocks vs Army on August 10 at Police Park

Semi-finals:

(e) Winners of (a) vs winners of (d) at Longden Place on August 15
(f) Winners of (b) vs winners of (c) at Nittawela on August 17.

Final on August 24 either Niattawela or Longden Place.