Army/CR and Havies/Police the games of the week

Friday, 16 January 2015 00:00 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

Round one of the rugby season was brought to a close during the first weekend of the month and the brand new year. Since then a lot of changes and events have taken place in the country starting with the presidential elections, the visit of the Pope, the canonisation of Sri Lanka’s first Saint and the inevitable change of guard at the various sports bodies. Hopefully, the end of politicisation of sports is at an end.

The service teams have enjoyed a fair degree of funding and it is left to be seen if this trend will continue. CH have been lamenting in the past few weeks on the lack of funding, the clashing of the cricket season with the rugby season and the resultant loss of a venue for practices. It is not clear if they will continue to take part and make up the numbers in the second round or if they will just lie down and fade away as done by certain clubs in the past. For a club which such a rich history it would indeed be a shame if they choose to opt out of the second round although as of now their continuation looks to be bleak. The points table of the top six teams after the end of the first round make interesting reading. Kandy and Navy appear to be in a class apart with very little differentiating the next three teams both in term of overall points as well the games won. Havies have lost some close games and any rugby enthusiast will opine that they could have done better at closing out games especially the games against Kandy and Navy, where they had a good lead and failed to capitalise on the same.

Army despite some limited talent and less that ordinary skills in terms of leadership skills at the helm, have done pretty well and will also be ruing the fact that they did not close out certain games. CR has blown hot and blown cold and appears to be most unpredictable. On their day together with the other mid table teams they appear to be able and capable of beating the best. Interestingly if we were to discount the bonus points, Kandy and Navy would be locked on equal points as would the Havies, CR and Army. Thus this all points to the fact that there is very little differentiating these teams in ability and to be a force to be reckoned with. Thus this week’s games of the mid table occupiers, Army/CR and Havies/Police will be games to watch. It provides all the teams with a great opportunity to get ahead and stay ahead whilst they plan and plot on winning strategies against the leaders Kandy and Navy. All in all an exciting and eventful year so far and hopefully the rugby will provide us with more thrills and spills. (The writer can be reached via [email protected].)

Army/CR and Havies/Police the games of the week

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