St. Sylvester’s College has started rugby physical training and nearly thirty young boys are seen at training and they have some of the last season’s players and it seems they have good talent and potential to perform well. This is one of the top sports promoting schools, and are celebrating 81 years, the school was founded in 1940 by Rev. Fr. D.Robert Perera O.S.B. who was the first principal. This is a school that has produced some top class sportsmen. The motto of the school is ‘Success through St. Sylvester’s College, better known for their boxing skills have turned out to be a striking force in school rugby in the recent past despite limited facilities, they have made steady progress in the game. They were the third school in Kandy to play rugger.
They started in 1954 with the famous Trinitian Bobby Jayaweera as the coach and Malcolm Marshall was the first captain, who later played for Navy and Defence Services. And there are references to the Sylvestrians playing a few friendly games between 1954-1956, but was forced to give up the game by end of ’56 due to a lack of facilities. It was revived in the mid-1982 due to the great efforts of then principal late Bertie Nillagoda. From that restart they have been doing well in the game. At one time Trinity College Asgiriya grounds curator late Alex Lazarus allowed St.Sylvester’s College rugger team to do their training in the mornings, due to that Sylvestrians rugby improved and they took the game seriously.
And some of the players who played club rugby without playing for the school were Nihal Pelpola played for Kandy Sports Club, Tony Direckez played for CR and FC, Gerard David he too played for Sri Lanka Air Force, Cyril Aluwihare played for over a decade as a winger for Kandy Sports Club, Sarath Basnayake, Nimal. Leweke played for Kandy SC and Sri Lanka Police and Sri Lanka Presidents XV, he also captained the Police team to win the Clifford Cup, and became the President of SLRFU and Sri Lanka Referees Society, Hector. Galuage played for Kandy Lake Club, Havelock Sports Club, Kandy Sports Club and Up-Country, Lucky Peries threw his lot with Kandy Sports Club and Sri Lanka Police, H. Marikar turned out to be a stalwart for Kandy Sports Club, Wasantha Ratnayale played for CR and FC, A. Fernando for Kandy Sports Club, Jeffry Jamalon played for Navy.
Then Manjula Pathirane became the first to play for the combined schools after rugby was started.
They have good talent and potential to perform well under the guidance of B.M. Dharmapala, he gave his best in the the year 2020. He is a coach who never touched the oval shaped ball in his school days, because his school had no rugger but was a good boxer. He started his rugby after joining the Army in 1987 and was first coached by Kalu Weerasinghe and also by P.G. Gunawardena. He turned out to be an exceptional player during a career spanning almost two decades including clubs and at National level. He has played for the country in five Asiads from 1998 and some of the coaches who helped him are Jeff Matheson, Ajith Abeyarthne, Tony Amith, Nimal Lewke, Ana Saranapala and late George Simpkin.
After hanging up his boots he took up coaching with the Army Sevens team and also schools like Prince of Wales, Maliyadewa, St. Anne’s, St. Anthony’s , Air Force , Sri Lanka team supporting coach, Sri Sumangala head coach for three years, So now this veteran coach is going all-out to put things in place to prepare for next school rugby season for Sylvestrians.
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