Thomians looking forward to another successful season

Dinesh WEERAWANSA

RUGBY: S. Thomas' College, Mt. Lavinia will be looking forward to another successful Inter-school Rugby season in 2006 after their impressive performance at last year's tournament.

Led by Sri Lanka under-19 captain Namal Rajapaksa, S. Thomas' emerged runners-up to Kingswood in the 2005 Singer Inter-school League Championship and also regained the coveted Gunaratne Trophy, beating their traditional rivals Royal 20-5 after a lapse of five years.

His younger brother Yoshitha Rajapaksa will captain S. Thomas' this year. No. 8 Rajapaksa has been a versatile young sportsman. Apart from his first love rugby, he has shown great form in shooting at national level and has also taken part in a couple of motor racing events.

In fact, S. Thomas' created history last year by having three brothers in their first XV team for two matches during the last season. Interestingly, all three, skipper Namal and his younger brothers Yoshitha and Rohitha, played in the Thomian 'pack', which undoubtedly could be a record.

This year's S. Thomas' team will have only two coloursmen in No. 8 Yoshitha Rajapaksa and his deputy cum centre Balachandran Thaneeshan. But the team is packed with several talented players who have first XV match experience during the last season.

The Thomians started off the 2006 season on a winning note, beating Zahira College by 33 points to 7 last week. But the real test for the Thomians would come today when they scrum down with Trinity in their Canon R.S. de Saram Shield match to be played at Bogambara Stadium, Kandy.

While the Thomians would come into the crucial game with their heads high, the Trinitians will try to forget the bitter experience they had last weekend, losing their centenary encounter against Kingswood 10-16. Leading Trinity in today's game will be No. 8 Imalka Maddumapatabendi.

Apart from today's match, S. Thomas' will have a few traditional fixtures as the holders - Gunaratne Trophy match against Royal, Lady Jayatillake Shield match against St. Joseph's and Archibald Perera Trophy encounter against St. Peter's.

The much looked forward to Royal-Thomian rugby encounter for the Michael Gunaratne Trophy will be played after the league season on September 16.

Drawn in Group 'A' for the league championship, the Thomians are down to play their tournament fixtures with Kingswood, St. Anthony's, St. Peter's, Ananda, Thurstan and Wesley.

The best era in Thomian rugby was from 1989 to 1991, during which they won 42 consecutive matches. The most impressive of them all was the 1989 team under Rizvi Suhayb.