The 82nd Battle of the Saints between St Joseph’s College and St Peter’s College is scheduled for the 4th and 5th of March 2016 at the P Sara Stadium. A media conference on this was held at the Sports ministry auditorium today.
Rev. Fr. Milan Bernard, Prefect of Games at St Joseph’s College started off proceedings with a prayer. This year Battle of the saints will be achieving greater heights together with Dialog as main sponsors of the big match.
Photo Album – 82nd Battle of the Saints media conference 2016
The battle for the Rev. Fr. Maurice Legoc trophy will be telecast live on Dialog TV and sent global on www.thepapare.com. Thereis more progress for this encounter this year with both school’s getting together and organizing the big match and limited over encounter. The motive behind having a joint committee is to attract more crowds to the two day encounter.
Chief guest of the big match will be Mr Berchman De Alwis who captained St Joseph’s College in the year 1964.
In the 82 years these two schools have met, St Joseph’s have won the trophy 12 times while St Peter’s have won it 9 times. The memorial trophy is currently in the hands of the Peterites after they won it in the year 2012 under the captaincy of Shehan Fernando. The Josephians are led by Sandaruwan Rodrigo while the Peterites is led by Vinu Mohotty.
The camaraderie between these two schools have stood out from the rest of the schools in the cricketing arena. As the Rector of St Peter’s, Rev Fr Trevor Martin rightfully said;
“When we speak of the Battle of the saints, we have maintained high standards. We say it’s a friendly kind of rivalry we maintain. We are all friends and you can clearly see how both schools blend in together at the matches. “
Rector of St Joseph’s Rev Fr Travis Gabriel spoke of their effort in trying to encourage more excitement in the two day match. He said;
” With the introductions of the 60 over rule we have seen 3 results in the two day encounter. But the crowd turnout has been quiet disappointing. We have been experimenting so many things in the last couple of years and this year and last year we have come together and built a joint committee to attract more crowd. “
Mr. Jeramy Huxtable, Group Chief Officer of Dialog Enterprise handed over the Sponsorship check to both Rectors. The rest of Sponsors including Elephant house and Nestle handed their sponsorship checks shortly afterwards. Terrance Fernando, Member of the joint committee rounded up the press conference with the vote of thanks.
