The 2015 edition of the Mercantile Sevens series got under way at the CR & FC grounds last afternoon amidst a sound audience. Known to be the clash of the corporates, 33 teams were battling it out for silverware which was on offer.
Incidentally the cup championship had only five teams in the main draw which include MAS A, MAS B, John Keels Holdings, Access Engineering & Dialog Axiata. The rest of the teams were evenly divided in the plate and bowl championships with the inclusion of a handful of new corporate teams who were playing the sport for the first time.
The first cup game for the evening was the encounter between the two MAS teams. Defending champions, the MAS ‘A’ side which looked to be Sri Lankan national sevens outfits were up against their own ‘B’ team. A match that looked to be a warm up game for the two saw Fazil Marija doing the honors for the MAS ‘A’ team and Lochana Girihagama went on to score for the MAS ‘B’ side. The game ended 31-14 in favor of the first side.
Towards the end of the night came the action under the floodlights with the second game of the Mercantile cup title where Dialog Axiata A took on John Keells A.
Mohammed Afzal started the scoring for Dialog when he stepped inward through the mid field to score the first (5-0). John Keells replied through a well worked try through their three quarters allowing Hirantha Perera to score (5-5). Kanchana Ramanayaka’s conversion brought them up by two points (7-5).
It was the famed chokeslam champion Bilal Hassen who was the next to cross over for Dialog asthey went up by five more points (10-7). Hassen’s try was followed up by a magnificent try by Rochana Hettiarachchi who covered over 70 meters to score (15-7). Continuing momentum it was Dinusha Chathuranga who crafted a 100 meter from his own try line to score (20-7). As Dialog’s Buweneka Udangamuwa did the final rites, the game ended at 27-7 as Dulaj Perera converted the last try.
The final game for the day was the cup match between Access Engineering and MAS ‘B’. Access who had likes of notable speedster Dhanushka Ranjan and national cap Sudarshana Muthuthanthiri were out to make an impressive opening statement.
Muthuthanthiri opened the scoring for Access after he collected the offload from Dulaj Perera (7-0). The Sri Lankan sevens man Richard Dharmapala did his cameo bit as he went on to score his first for the tournament covering a fair 60 meters and later converted it himself (14-0).
With Access being too fast for MAS side to counter, it was Dhanushka Ranjan who followed up by scoring his first under the post (21-0). With two more tries huddling up just before the full time whistle and Access had whitewashed the MAS B side 35-0.
