Royal-Thomian tennis clash for Pereira trophy

The Annual Royal-Thomian Tennis Encounter for the E.F.C. Pereira Challenge Trophy will be played on October 29 at the Sri Lanka Tennis Association (SLTA) hard courts at 10.00 am.

The trophy donated by D.L. Seneviratne (Old Royalist and former President of the SLTA) is named in memory of E.F.C. Pereira who was a teacher at Royal College for 20 years and thereafter a teacher at S. Thomas for a further 18 years. He was the teacher in charge of tennis at both Schools.

This is the seventh encounter in the series and Royal College has won all six encounters played so far.

The winner of the Under 19 tie will be awarded the Trophy. There will also be an Under 15 and Under 13 age group Ties as well. Each Tie consists of three singles and two double matches.

The Royal College team is captained by Davis Cup poolist M. A. Shakir and the other key players are emerging talents Shamal Dissanayake, Inzam Irfan and Danushka Abeywardena in the junior fleets.

The S. Thomas team is led by Jonathan Edward with Avishka Perera and Venuka Hulangamuwa. Thomian junior teams will include Jerique Rajapaksha, Akshath Perera and Avindra Perera.

The Royalists are coached by K. Rajkumar whilst Sylvester Francis is the coach of the S. Thomas team.