In a communiqué issued by the Sri Lanka Rugby Football union today, it was announced that Sri Lanka has found entry as the 3rd Asian team in the Hong Kong 7s to kick off in March 2014.
The media release states that the International Rugby Board had made a decision yesterday to include a 3rd Asian team in the Hong Kong 7’s.
The Hong Kong 7’s is the No 1 Rugby 7’s tournament in the World and the last time Srilanka participated was in 2004 when over 6 teams from Asia were invited to participate and World rankings were not the only criteria for participating in World 7’s tournaments.
Sri Lanka under the leadership of Fazil Marija finished 3rd in the Asian 7’s ranking tournaments this year the highest position they have ever achieved in the history of the nation’s rugby beating Asian heavy weights Korea,Taiwan and Malaysia to set up automatic qualification.
Initially only 2 teams from Asia were eligible for qualification for the 2014 HK 7’s but after representations made by the SLRFU to the IRB and ARFU, the matter has been taken up and a positive response was received by Sri Lanka yesterday.
This is tremendous achievement for Sri Lanka and will be a major boost to rugby in this country in general. Sri Lanka had a very busy international calendar in 2013 with 3 Asian tournaments in Hong Kong, Dubai and Japan and the Serendib cup for the 15s team and Rugby in general has been escalated to becoming a top end spectator sport in Sri Lank. he players who came together most times at short notice and banded together as one team must be applauded in this instance. clearly made good governance and this an impact .
‘This is major achievement by the players and administration and Sri Lanka rugby is on the right track’ said President of the SLRFU Asanga Seneviratne who was recently appointed as the Secretary General of Asian Rugby. “It is imperative we push Asian rugby on to the world stage and give them an opportunity to participate in more international tournaments around the world. We have 3 Asian tournaments in Hong Kong, Dubai and Japan in the World 7’s circuit and only 1 other Asian teams participates in the other 2 tournaments. We are pushing for 2 in the other tournaments for 2014 and will hopefully be able to push for 3 from 2015� said Seneviratne.
The IRB and ARFU have both complimented Sri lanka at their respective AGM’s on conducting a successful Dailog Serendib Tri Nation Series with teams from other continents thus setting the stage for wider participation amongst countries with similar ability thus making the World Rankings much more competitive and credible.
This was a first for World Rugby and as the fastest growing sport in the world the governing body is now positioning countries according to divisions and are hoping to encourage and help teams to play each other accordingly and not just in their continent. This is vital for Rugby to be universally accepted as a global entity and increase participation.
Sri Lanka Rugby has gone from strength to strength in the last 2 years and the investment made in players, coaches and tournaments is bearing dividends. The recent change of timing made to the Dailog league for the club championship is already proving a great success with rugby now played in conditions more suited to the game. The weather from Nov – March is around 16 – 25 degrees in comparison to April – Sept which is around 25 – 34 degrees. The quality of matches has seen a marked improvement and the injury count is much lower.
The Rugby calendar for 2014 – 15 is going to be exciting and filled with world class action with the HK 7’s,Asian 5 Nations, Commonwealth Games, Asian Games and the Carlton World 7’s taking centre Stage giving our players the maximum exposure.
The Carlton World 7’s has to be given full credit for our improvement in the 7’s game.
