Noor and Eranda - latest additions to CR and FC

RANJEEVA SENEVIRATNE

Sri Lanka youth player Ishan Noor and Kandy Sports Club winger Eranda Weerakkody are the latest additions to the Ceylonese Rugby and Football Club for the 2009 rugby season.

Noor who had an excellent season for his school St. Peter's last year turned out for the Sri Lanka Under-20 team in the Youth Rugby Asiad in South Korea in November, 2008 while Weerakkody a utility player who could play either as a winger or full back was a member of the champion Kandy Sports Club team of last year.

Earlier Sri Lanka centre and Isipatana skipper Dinusha Chathuranga and Sri Lanka youth players Dilanka Gunatilleke (Dharmaraja), Mohamed Rizwan (Kingswood) and Srinath Sooriyabandara (Isipatana) joined the Longden Place Club.

Weerakkody along with Chathuranga and Sooriyabandara are expected to play for the CR and FC in the first leg of the Inter-Club Rugby Sevens at Nittawela on February 7 and 8.

The Red Shirts led by Sri Lanka flanker Ashen Karthelis will also have the services of national sevens players Danushka Perera, Ashan de Costa, Lasintha de Costa, Amjad Buksh, Dushanth Lewke and Dinesh Kumara and will go all out to clinch the Rugby Sevens title which has eluded them since 2006 when they won the second leg of the Singer Professional Sevens at Ratgama by beating Air Force by 36 points to 29 in the final.

Meanwhile CH and FC have obtained the services of former Sri Lanka and CR and FC centre Avantha Hettiarachchi and ex-Kandy SC full back Danushka Pushpakumara for the 2009 rugby season.

Hettiarachchi who played for CR and FC in 2006 and 2007 donned the Sri Lanka Jersey at the Singer Rugby Asiad in 2007 while Pushpakumara played for Kandy SC in 2006 and 2007 having turned out for CR and FC in 2005.

Earlier last year's Royal and Sri Lanka hooker Bilal Hassan and Josephian and Sri Lanka Under-20 fly half Shanaka Pietersz joined the Maitland Crescent Club which will be led by Sri Lanka hooker Achala Perera this year.