Four unbeaten teams clash for top spot

By. M. Shamil Amit

May.21 (Mirror Sports) - The Dialog Schools Rugby League tournament is now in full flow with the completion of the fourth round matches last week and now reaching the tail-end stage of the league segment before it shifts to the Cup segment.

Four teams, two each in the Group 1A defending champions Trinity and Isipathana and in the Group 1B last year’s runner up Wesley and St Peter’s have won the four matches that they have played so far and will move onto the field with the aim of finishing as the top teams in the two groups.

This weekend St Peter’s will host Wesley at Bambalapitiya on Saturday and Isipathana will host Trinity at Havelock Park on Sunday.

Apart from these two matches there are five more matches down for decision in Colombo with all to be played on Saturday. Two of the five matches are crucial for three teams, S. Thomas’, Zahira and Royal.

The three teams have three matches each and are vying for the top two slots in Group C to qualify to the Cup segment.

After the completion of the fourth round, S. Thomas’ leads with 20 points followed by Zahira in second and Royal third with 19 points each. Arch rivals Royal and S. Thomas’s will lock horns at the Royal Sports Complex and Zahira will play host to Thurstan at Maradana.

The other three matches are St Joseph’s versus Prince of Wales at Longdon Place, Ananda versus Mahanama at Rajagiriya and DSS versus Lumbini MV at Havelock Park. St Peter’s vs Wesley It’s going to be an acid test for the two unbeaten teams and they will be meeting each other for the second time this year having confronted each other in the knockout tournament where the Wesleyites came out winners.

St Peter’s will be seeking to take revenge of their 29-36 defeat in the knockout quarter final this year and Wesley will aim to make a repeat of that win and whoever succeeds will end up as the top team in their group.

The Peterites led by No 8 Shenuka Perera got off to a flying start with a runaway 67-0 win over Mahanama and then went on to post two more big wins against traditional rivals St Joseph’s (50- 19) and Prince of Wales (65-21) but they were given a fright by Ananda as they just managed to scrape through with a two point win (34-32). Skipper Shenuka will bank on his talented players in the likes of second row Revone Perera, flankers Lakindu Ranasinghe and Hashara Madugasge, wingers Geon Rajit and Jamaal Wahab to name a few who all have been in the forefront.

On the other hand Wesley led by centre Kaizer Lye too kicked off the season with a resounding 69-12 win over Prince of Wales and chalked up wins against Mahanama (36-12), Ananda (36-18) and St Joseph’s (23-10).

The Wesleyites have been consistent and this being a crucial game for the battle of the top slot it’s left to be seen whether they could keep up the momentum and make a repeat of the knockout win. The players whom skipper Kaizer will be relying to deliver the goods are No 8 Manuga Jayaweera who had a fairly good game against St Joseph’s, wingers Prathana Rodrigo and Ayaan Hussain, props Nelith Hapugalla and Abdul Rahaman, centre Shifan Intikhab and full back Mohamed Fawaz.

Royal vs S. Thomas’ The two teams will move into the game with confidence after their wins against Kingswood and Zahira. However the two teams underwent some anxious moments before seeing the winning post against their opponents. They too will be meeting each for the second time this year having earlier locked horns in the knockout tournament quarter final which Royal won 25-5.

Royal led by Disas Pathirana began their campaign with a comfortable win over Science College (43-10) and then overcame Thurstan (40-15) before undergoing a defeat to Zahira (26-29).

S. Thomas’ spearheaded by No 8 Mckyle Karunaratne started off with a shocking 27-24 loss to Thurstan but came back to chalk up wins against Kingswood (33-12) and Science College (41-13) The two teams got talented players with Thomian skipper Mckyle pinning hopes on Mayanka Dias, Rehan Warnasuriya, Rometh Wijesinghe,   Eyan Pereira, Vishwa Ariyawansa and Zaydaan Akbar while Royal skipper Disas will bank on Senuja Ranasinghe, Simak Shafeek, Kavan Ratnayake, Dinuka Perera, Akira Yatawara and Methuka Wickramaratne.

Apart from the league encounter the two sides will battle it out for the Michael Gunaratne Trophy which is the 62nd in the series. Royal are the holders and they lead the series with 37 wins to 19 by S. Thomas’.

Zahira vs Thurstan

Zahira with three wins against Kingswood (20-15), Science College (31- 25) and Royal (29-26) and a loss to S. Thomas’ (26-35) is favoured to come out on top against Thurstan who have two wins under their belt against S. Thomas (37-24) and Kingswood 25-21) and two defeats to Royal (15-40) and Science (14-26).

Zahira, one of the contenders of the Cup segment slot in Group C for sure will not leave any stone unturned to achieve the feat.