Musaeus, Sangamitta joint hockey champs

S M Jiffrey Abdeen, - Kandy Sports Corr

Musaeus College, Colombo held the strong Sangamitta Balika Vidyalaya to a thrilling one-all draw to finish as joint champions at the All Island Schools Girls Under-17 Hockey Championship organized by the Sri Lanka Schools Hockey Association and played at Shalika Grounds yesterday. At half time the Sangamitta Girls led 1-0. It was an excellent display by the girls from Musaeus College who were up against a stronger side from the hockey town of Matale. They displayed excellent fighting spirits and this was biggest success in hockey in their history.

This performance by Musaeus stickers is another feather in the cap of their dedicated coach Nimal Etipola who has given a new dimension to this sport in the school.

Last month they won the All Island Under-17 Championship organized by Joseph Vaz College.

It was Sangamitta Balika Vidyalaya who scored first through centre forward Navodya Ekanayake to take up an early lead.

But the second saw the Musaeus College putting up a stirring performance which put Sangamitta girls on the defensive and it was only a matter of time before Musaeus College obtained the equalizer through Dineth Sathiyapola.

S Bernard and Dineshi Perera umpired.

In the quarter finals Seetha Devi BV beat St Anthony’s Girls College 2-1 on penalty strokes.

Sangamitta BV beat Bishops College 3-0, Musaeus College beat Janadhipathi Vidyalaya, Nawala 3-1 on penalty strokes, Pushpadana Girls College beat Girls High School, Kandy 1-0. In the semi-finals Sangamitta BV scored a stunning 1-0 win over the defending champions Seetha Devi BV 1-0 with Navodya Ekanayake scoring the winning goal.

In the second semi-final Musaeus College turned out to be giant killers when they beat Pushpadana Girls College 1-0 with the match winning goal scored by Dinethi Sathyapala.

Seetha Devi Balika Vidyalaya clinched the third place by defeating Pushpadana Girls College 3-2 on penalty strokes in the consolation finals.