Invitational Rugby Sevens 2021: Combined Kandy team rejected

Wednesday, 6 October 2021 00:00 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

By Shamseer Jaleel

The organisers of the Invitational Rugby Sevens 2021 – Police SC – has rejected the appeal made by a few Kandy players who formed a team in order to participate at the sevens tournament on 30 and 31 October tournament

Danushka Dyan and his teammates will miss out on AR 7s representation

which will take place at the Police Park.

This was purely done by the organisers as permission was given only for the eight ‘A’ division clubs to participate in this event. Earlier, even ‘B’ and ‘C’ division participation requests were rejected. Further, there will be no Women’s sevens events worked off along with the Men’s tournament.

Sri Lanka Air Force, Sri Lanka Army, Sri Lanka Police and Sri Lanka Navy will field two teams each, while Havelock SC and CH & FC will field one team each, taking the total to 10. CH & FC will be housed at Sri Lanka Navy camp – Welisara while Havelock SC will be looked after by Sri Lanka Air Force. All players will be quarantined 10 days before the event with a negative PCR report plus both vaccinations. When they get out from the tournament, an antigen test will be done to make sure no positive cases get in to the society.

With the Kandy SC and CR & FC players not featuring in this event, this will eliminate them from being selected for the Asia Rugby Sevens which will be worked off in UAE in November 2021.

As Sri Lanka Rugby (SLR) has informed that this event will be used as a yard stick for the national sevens selections for UAE event, the majority of the rugby-loving public are confused since this event is an invitational tournament, and it’s unfair for the players from Kandy SC and CR to be left out of selections as majority of the leading sevens players come from these two clubs. This means players and top-class sevens players such as Tharinda Ratwatte, Nigel Ratwatte, Danushka Ranjan, Kavindu Perera, Jason Dissanayake, Lavanga Perera, Buddima Piyaratne, Srinarth Sooriyabandara, Kavindu de Costa and sevens skipper Danushka Dyan all will miss their opportunity of a national representation at the AR sevens in UAE due to none of their faults.