Unbeaten Trinity and Royal warm up for Bradby Shield

Tuesday, 28 April 2015 00:10 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

By Shamseer Jaleel Traditional rivals Trinity and Royal continued their unbeaten run in the Singer league Under 20 division I rugby encounter as at last weekend with one more match to be played by each team. Royal had a grand outing beating St. Thomas’ Mount Lavinia, played for the Michael Gunaratne Trophy. Royal retained the trophy with a one-horse race when they outclassed the lads from Mount Lavinia by 52 to nothing with a good display of forward rugby. Meanwhile, Trinity which was also in Colombo during the weekend, edged out Science College 22/17 in a close encounter at Mount Lavinia, playing minus two of their regular players recovering from injuries before their Bradby encounter on 9 May.

Trinity led by national youth player Isuru Rangala had to fire all cylinders before overcoming a spirited Science outfit, the dark horse of the tournament. Though with limited support financially, the effort put by Science boys is commendable on the field. Their three quarter line looked threatening with some fine moves, but ball handling let them down, badly missing out on at least two scoring opportunities. Isipathana too continued their unbeaten run with a close 20/18 win over the Petrites. Kicking at goal continued to be the worry for the Havelock Road lads. Joes too pulled off with a win thanks to a second-half burst to down the Randles Hill lads by 24/17. This was the second close defeat for the Kingswoodians earlier going down to the Peterites in a last minute penalty. Meanwhile the Antonians registered their first win this season when they went past a demotivated Rajans by 30/17. Wesley had a good weekend when they registered their very first win in the Singer league when they outclassed C.W.W. Kanangara 61 to nothing. With a week’s break for the Vesak holidays, the Singer League under 20 encounters will re-start with four matches out of the six to be played in Kandy grounds with four Kandy teams in division I – Trinity, Antonians, Kingswood and Dharmaraja – having their home games.