Joe-Pete encounter takes top billing at school rugby knockout semis

By A Special Sports Correspondent

The semi-finals of the school’s rugby President’s Trophy knockout tournament will be worked off this weekend with reigning champions Isipatana taking on Zahira on Saturday (September 2) and St. Peter’s scrumming down with arch-rivals St. Joseph’s the next day in the other semi-final. Both matches will be worked off at Havelock Park. The tournament is conducted by the Sri Lanka Schools Rugby Football Association and is sponsored by Dialog.

Isipatana badly needs this semi-final win to beef up their morale because they know that they were beatable this season. Their opponents Zahira is no pushover and produced some memorable wins this year; the victories against Dharmaraja (18-15) and Vidyartha (23-3) stand out as their best performances to date. The predictions are that the Greens would win given that their indefatigable backline would produce the results when it comes to try scoring. Navin Kanishka leads Isipatana while Aadil Rafeek leads the lads from Maradana.

St. Peter’s will go out as firm favourites in their clash against the Josephians and the organizers of the tournament have given them the green light to consider this fixture as their traditional rugby encounter which is played for the Fr. Basil Weerathunga Shield. Hence a packed audience is expected on Sunday when the two teams clash to find the second finalist for the knockout finals.

The Peterites are led this season by flanker Ashain Madugasge while the Josephians are marshalled by that able third row forward Navin Marasinghe whose players destroyed St. Anthony’s Katugastota (57-0) on their way to the semi-finals. The Peterites got the better of Trinity (25-13) in their quarter-final game played last Sunday. Josephians have done well to make a comeback this season and reached the semi-finals of the knockout given their bellow par show in the league tournament where they finished seventh in the points table behind Zahira who finished sixth. This year’s knockouts began only with seven teams without the runners-up in the league Royal which chose instead to feature in their traditional rugby game against S.Thomas’; a team that finished eighth in the league tournament points table.