‘CR aim to clinch League title this year’

Ranjeeva Seneviratne

The aim of the Ceylonese Rugby and Football Club is to clinch the ‘A’ Division League Rugby Title this year which has eluded us for the last ten years,” said the newly elected President of the Club Jehan CanagaRetna.

CR and FC last bagged the ‘A’ Division League Title in 1998 under the leadership of Champika Nishantha but since then they have come off second best to champions Kandy SC except for 2001 and 2003 when Army and CH and FC emerged runners up respectively.

“We have obtained the services of two top players from Kandy SC - centre Chamara Vithanage and Winger Eranda Weerakkody in addition to Sri Lanka centre Dinusha Chathuranga and Sri Lanka Youth players Ishan Noor (St. Peter’s), Mohamed Rizwan (Kingswood) and Srinath Sooriyabandara (Isipatana) and are confident of bagging the ‘A’ Division League this year,” said CanagaRetna.

“The club has also contracted a top coach from New Zealand John Carrington, an IRB level four coach who should be able to mould us into a champion outfit,” said the new President of the club.

The Longden Place club will be led by former Thomian Skipper and Sri Lanka flanker Ashan Karthalis and is packed with national players Shamil Mohamed, Anuja Perera, Danushka Boteju, Dushanth Lewke, Kasun de Silva, Danushka Perera, Ashan de Costa, Lasintha de Costa, Dinesh Kumara and Reza Mubarak.

CanagaRetna an outstanding scrum half played for Royal in 1984 and 1985 and also turned out for Colombo Schools in the Gratiaen Cup match against Outstation Schools in 1984 and also represented the Sri Lanka under 20 team led by Ikram Odayar in the Asian Youth Rugby Championship in Chinese Taipei in 1985.

Former Thomian Chirantha de Zoysa was elected as the Secretary. An excellent fly half he played for the champion Thomian rugby teams from 1989 to 1991 and later donned the Red Jersey for the Longden Place Club.

Ex-Thomian, Havelocks and CR and FC lock forward Rienzie Fernando is the new Deputy President while Aashiq Lafir (better known in the cricketing sphere) is the Treasurer of the club.