The Peterites were kept waiting to Look Over Their Shoulders Until Next Week
By Brian Thomas Reporting for SriLankaSports.com
Edited by Christopher Jordashe
Trinity 29, St Joseph’s 07 at the CR & FC
Trinity, with this emphatic win, qualifies for the Cup Championship alongside St. Thomas’, Wesley, Isipathana, and Royal, while defending champions St. Peter’s keep looking over their shoulders as they need to get past DS next week.
Trinity was all over the Josephians in the first half. What the Josephians were doing in this half is the question posed by many. They let the Trinity line get into motion; they, for reasons best known to them, let the Trinity forwards dictate terms and gain territory. Guess an offer of this magnitude—Trinity will feast big time.
In the 4th minute, they forced a line-out through a neatly executed line kick, got within the 5-meter line of the whitewash, formed a driving maul, and pushed the heavy Josephian forwards by changing direction to score on the left flank for an unconverted try.
Trinity kept the pressure on; they started gaining territory through their heavy forwards. Using their three-quarter line with Shan Altaf playing as number 10, he kicked once again—a 22-50 line kick, won the line-out throw from the 5-meter yard yet again from the whitewash of the Josephians’ red zone—for Kumarasinghe to touch down off the rolling maul, and Altaf punched it through the posts to go 12-nil in the 9th minute.
Trinity kept hitting the fringes as St. Joseph’s were guilty of too many infringements. The 3rd try for Trinity came off a 5-yard scrum because the Saints knocked on inside their 5-yard line. Trinity went ahead through Kumarasinghe yet again, but Altaf missed a kickable conversion.
The Josephians came back with a lot of firepower, but they realized breaking through the defence of Trinity looked herculean.
Just 10 minutes before lemons, Trinity touched down again, this time setting their three-quarter line in motion for another unconverted bonus try.
The scoreline at the breather was Trinity 22, St. Joseph’s 00.
Sadly, the Josephians not only made forced errors and infringements with high tackles but even lamented with 14 men on the park.
It was good to see the intent of the home team in the second half. They defended their whitewash as Fazil Marjah brought in his 3-player bench strength. They even attacked the fringes and scored off an excellent pick-and-go try, which they did well to convert after the turnaround.
Trinity hit back with a goal after creating 4 phases, for Shan Altaf to go ahead under the post and convert his own try. Trinity won 29 points to 7.
They qualify for the Cup segment. Talking to Head Coach Marjah— as usual, humble in victory—he, on request by me, stated he had no choice but to rest Sathishkumar, the number 8, with a little niggle; Warusamana, the Trinity inside, with a concussion concern; and the regular hooker, to keep him free from aggravating a niggle.
Wesley 23, St. Peter’s 05
The intent shown by Wesley from the kick-off gave indications that the Peterites were more in defence than attack, because Wesley kept possession but lacked a loophole to cross the whitewash. St. Peter’s opened the gate when one of their forwards was found guilty of a high tackle, giving Wesley a penalty for the Double Blues to lead 3-nil.
No doubt Wesley dominated in the breakdowns, as the Peterites were found wanting—not capitalising.
Wesley stuck together, and the Wesley scrum-half eyeballed the gap, broke free to get the support of Lye, who went over for an unconverted try.
St. Peter’s took lemons on 8 points to nil.
The turnaround did no favours for the defending champions. Frustration set in as their defence took a tumble. An infringement at a breakdown by the Peterites gave Wesley another opportunity to add points to their 8-point tally. Wesley’s full-back had his kicking boots on, and the Double Blues took the lead to 11 with the penalty conversion.
Wesley, with an 11-point cushion—that too in the second half—forced the Peterites into a rolling maul defence mode. The initial rolling maul collapsed, but Wesley made sure perfection was the way to go on the second opportunity and scored their second try mid-left. The kicking boots of Wesley full-back Abdul Hadhi sailed through for Wesley to lead 18 points to nil.
The scoreboard pressure got the better of the defending champions. A Peterite player was sin-binned for unfair play; hence the visitors were reduced to 14 players.
Wesley outplayed St. Peter’s in all facets of the game from here on. Infringements, unforced errors, including isolation of players in mauls and rucks, were created by Wesley through their sharp awareness of the game.
They forced another rolling maul by gaining territorial advantage, and did the scoring through their strong forwards—through another rolling maul—to dump their opponents and lead 23 points to nil.
Wesley were no angels in the park either. They were reduced to 13 on the park for the last 10 minutes, and the Saints got a consolation try. But the Double Blues raised the champagne glass with a 23-points-to-5 win and not only qualified for the Cup Championship but led the Group 1 points table. This win against SPC comes after a long-awaited few seasons, and Wesley thoroughly deserved it because they played with purpose, having the will to win.
Wesley’s coaching staff, headed by Henry, have done yeoman service for this famous victory.
Isipathana 38, Zahira 27
The half-time score read Isipathana 26, Zahira 8. The Zahira supporters surely looked disappointed, thinking, “Are we going in for a half-century score of any sort at midway?”
“The Green Machine has started to grind at last,” thought the Pathana supporters, after the scare they got from Dharmaraja, Mahanama, and even Kingswood to a great extent.
The Isipathana brand of rugby came back to life at last, after they ran down 4 tries with 3 conversions, camping all over the Zahira territory, exhibiting open rugby, working their skill levels in breakdowns, rucks, and mauls—and most importantly, their heavy set of forwards set in motion with an excellent display of converting the breakdowns to points.
Having stated that, it was Zahira who opened the scoring in the 4th minute to go 5-nil, but Isipathana struck back using their heavier forwards to help them gain territory, and their speedy three-quarters were set in motion to do the handy work in crossing over the Zahira whitewash 4 times in the first half and securing the bonus point with the early dose.
Zahira incidentally reduced the deficit in the first half after Pathana led 12 points to 5, by converting a penalty for the scoreboard to read 12 points to 8 midway through the first half.
The Green Machine’s superiority got them 2 more tries, both converted, to give the Green Shirts a bite at the lemons triumphant, while going through their dehydration process.
The second half saw Zahira come back to life after being led by another converted try—leading by 33 points to 8—as Isipathana not only lost a player with a red card for a dangerous high tackle, but got into an unexpected slumber when Zahira scored 3 tries and converted 2 of them, outplaying the Green Machine defence, to have the players and their respective supporters in a trance with hope to create an upset.
“Is everything alright?” was the bell ringing in the ears of the Pathana players as intensity and aggression were high.
As Isipathana led 33 points to 8, whilst the spectators envisaged it’s all done and dusted, Zahira closed in with an excellent try and conversion in the 42nd minute to close in at 33 points to 15.
They took advantage of Isipathana having a 14-man defensive line due to the red card issue, forced a perfect rolling maul, scored a converted try, and closed in at 22 points to 33.
Isipathana made a hash of proceedings with unnecessary forced errors but was saved by the bell. Compliments of the fresh legs introduced, Dhansara Witharana crashed past the Zahira defence to score an unconverted try.
38 to 22. Zahira, just before the final trumpet, during the run of play, touched down for their 4th try, and the scoreboard read 38 points to 27. Isipathana home by an 11-point margin, conceding a bonus point to the brave, never-say-die tankers—Zahira.
Keep reading as we present three more wins, Royal, Ananda and Kingswood in our next script coming out shortly.
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