The Sri Lankan rugby squad was welcomed by a heavy battering at the hands of rugby Giants England and Australia today. Sri Lanka who fielded a below par team came out with more than what was expected from them by keeping the opponents to respectable scores.
The Sri Lankan sevens squad led by experienced Radhika Hettiarachchi met a strong England side who meant nothing but business hammering a whopping 59 points to 07 in their group ‘D’ played today. The Englishmen who are one of the favourites in the tournament scored heavily in the first half not giving anything away to their Sri Lankan counterparts. First half ended with the scoreboard reading 33 nil with James Rodwell scoring three superb tries.
The second half saw the Lankans putting up the first points on the board through nippy half back Srinath Sooriyabandara in the 2nd minute with skipper Radhika putting the extra points. It was then England who took charge to win the game 59-07 with the England skipper Gollings leading the way with two solid tries.
Sri Lanka in their second game against the Ausies gave in a better performance by limiting the score under 50 points. The Wallabies who were much stronger and heavily built gave the Lankans a torrid time in the first half scoring 35 points and it looked as if it will be a another cake walk for the Kangaroos. The Sri Lankan team then came out with a superb display of character when they scored through CR&FC scrum half Srinath Sooriyabandara who scored his second try of the match to make it 35-07. Srinath and co. though small in stature battled it out against the bigger opponents from down under to retain them to just 07 points in the second half. At one point the Ausies looked a bit amateurish with the Lankans creating gaps which almost resulted in the second try of the game for the Lankans. Australia went on to lose to England in their final pool match 21-19.
The third game which was against Uganda was a closely contested one with both teams going in neck to neck trying to get in to the next round. It was our own warriors who scored the first try through Saliya Handapangoda from Army SC in the 2nd minute of the game but the Ugandans proved to be far more superior in open play and in the breakdowns which cost the Lankans the game. Uganda who led 21-05 went on to add 14 more points to finish 35-05 at full time.
No comments:
Post a Comment