The defending champions, Havelock’s Sports club, fended off an initial fight by Sri Lanka Air Force to overcome the Airmen by 48 points to 08.
A continuous drip at Havelock Park, soggy conditions and a delayed start were major dampeners for the day’s game. One gets the feeling as if the venue is jinxed with the last match at the same venue being rescheduled due to failure with the lights. The “Singing” airmen were the most visible point of interest pre match with their patriotic war songs. But the lights did stay on and the ground held for play to go forward.
The Airmen came out “guns blazing” bringing a flare to their game and took the pressure to the hosts. The first quarter of the game saw the Airmen pile on the pressure particularly with some heavy forward play. The blue jerseys saw their efforts rewarded with a penalty coming their way and A.Perera slotted the ball across to give his side the first points for the game. 3 nothing Air Force.
It did not take the defending champions long to reply as Chamara Dabare went over for the first points for Havelocks. Mohamed Sheriff missed the conversion and the scores read 5-3 to the hosts. The visitors had the chance to put their nose ahead of the race but A. Perera’s penalty shot found the posts.
The pendulum swung again as the visitor’s flanker F.Donald flew to the try line shrugging Niroshan Fernando’s outstretched defense. Perera was unsuccessful with the conversion but the Airmen were ahead to the delight of their supporters. 8-5 Air Force. The airmen would have been sniffing an upset in the air as they upped their game. And then came Sandun Herath… the first of his many tries was a brilliant support from across the field to his fellow winger Dabare which saw him go over with his usual burst of speed. With Sheriff’s conversion going astray the try was the only disturbance to the score, 10-8 Havies back in the lead. The home team extended their lead further with a push over try courtesy of T. Samarathilake, and Sheriff finally came good with a kick at goal. 17-8 Havelock’s.
Just on the stroke half time Sandun Herath was once more on the scene with a good looking dummy which sent the defense helter skelter and Herath scored. With the conversion being successful the scores going into the half were in favour of the hosts 24-8. Players from both camps were sent off on the verge of half time big Terrence Henry for Havelock’s and A.Dhananjaya for the Airmen.
The second half was an all Havelock’s half as the hosts defense held not allowing the opponents to score as they went on a try spree. Sandun Herath coming into the action twice and Shehan “Lema” Pathirana also got on the board. The score board closed with Havelocks Sports Club recording a comfortable 48-8 win over the Airmen.
Cards were a plenty on the day with the second half also seeing the referee hoisting the colours, notably R. Meedin the nippy Havies scrum half was shown a red card for stomping. There were the moments which saw the players flaring up but of course there were also the moments where true camaraderie which was also displayed, especially Sharo Fernando knocking the lights out of an Airforce defender and then coming back for a “you-okay-matey”.
Sandun Herath was the man of the match with his barrage of tries. On the leadership end of matters Sudarshan Muthuthanthri was the stand in captain with regular Dhiren Warankulasuriya being sidelined due to injury. ThePapare caught up with the Dhiren for his view from the sideline about the team and his view was that the team was playing only in patches and will need some fine tuning particularly with the big games to come ahead. The recovery of the Havelock’s captain will definitely be critical with the more important games to follow.
