Under-20 President’s League schools rugby

Thomians prevail over Isipathana

By M Naushad Amit
In a contest between strength and speed, the strong S. Thomas’ side prevailed to record a thrilling win over the speedy Isipathana by 28-12 after trailing 3-12 at half time in an Under-20 President’s League inter-school rugby match played at Havelock Park yesterday. S. Thomas’ collected their points through three tries of which two of them were converted and three penalties. Isipathana scored two tries and managed to convert only one. Though S. Thomas’ had a clear 16 points deficit at the end of the final whistle, they were taken ashore mainly by their place kicker, fullback Arjun Manoharan who managed to collect 13 points with his accurate kicking. Manoharan put across all three penalties that came in S. Thomas’ favour and also successfully converted two of the three tries. His third attempt just missed as the ball hit the post.

The Thomians drew first blood when Manoharan put through an early penalty to lead 3-nil in the early stage of the game. But Isipathana taking home ground advantage to account retaliated with two tries which came from wing-three-quarter Vishwamitra Jayasinghe who ran a good length and prop Tharindu Siriwardene who scored off a push over. Their fullback, Prasad Devinda only managed to add extra points off the second try as Isipathana lead the first half by 12 points to 3. However S. Thomas’ who had a stronger team than the hosts breached the Isipathana territory on three occasions in the first half. But the speedy Isipathana players managed to hold the visitors back from scoring a single try while S. Thomas’ made a few ball-passing blunders that could have turned into easy points before the short whistle.

After the turn around Isipathana were given the shivers when S. Thomas’ hit back with a converted try scored off centre Vivian Rudra and a penalty in successive sessions to pip over 13-12. Star of the day Thomian Manoharan added a further three points to the total briefly after both teams tried to overpower each other to score. With a further fifteen minutes of play left S. Thomas’ gained total control of the game while all attempts made by the avenging Isipathana forwards were averted. In the dying stages of the game Thomian prop forward Amrick Andrado landed a try which was successfully put over by Manoharan to further extend the lead by 23-12. No.8 Rajindra Gunasekara scored the third try for the Mt. Lavinia School in the last minute of the game which went unconverted. The game was controlled by Aruna Jayasekara.