The Sri Lanka schools under 20 seven aside tournament is scheduled to kick off on the 16th and 17th of February which will be the curtain raiser for the under 20 season.
Last year a handful of schools refused to take part in the schools knock out tournament and the schools secretary stated that they will not be allowed to take part in any of the tournaments which is organized by the schools section in 2013. League champs Isipathana and runner up Trinity had walk over’s going in to the semi finals due to the unavailability of teams.
However ThePapare.com learns the respective schools have been given permission by the SLSRFA to participate in the upcoming schools U-20 curtain raiser.
“Our main aim is to get maximum participation from the local tournaments, therefore we have requested all teams who were unable to take part in last year’s knock out tournament to send an official letter of request to the schools union if they wanted to take part”.
“So far only St. Peters have sent us an official request letter stating their intentions to play, however Royal, C. W. W Kannangara and S. Thomas’ are yet to confirm their participation”, said Mendis. The schools association secretary also mentioned that the three schools (RC, STC & C. W. W) have shown interest in participating in the sevens tournament but haven’t given a letter in writing up to date.
Mendis stated that St. Josephs College, Lalith Athulathmudali, Thurstan and St. Anne’s Kurunegala will not play a part in the tournament due to unavoidable circumstances. The tournament draw will be held on the 2nd of February.
The inter school rugby season is to get underway this weekend (2nd & 3rd February) with the under 18 All Island sevens tournament.
