Anuranga Walpola appointed Head Coach of S’ Thomas

Anuranga Walpola

By Shamseer Jaleel

Former Isipathana College, CR and FC, Kandy SC and national XV a side player, Anuranga Walpola was appointed as the S’ Thomas College Mount Lavinia rugby outfit Head Coach for the 2024 rugby season.

Walpola played for the Green Shirts from 1999 to 2002 and led the outfit in his last year. He toured with the national Under-19 outfit for the Junior Rugby Asiad to Japan and later in 2001 toured Chile for the Junior Rugby World Cup. Sri Lanka Youths qualified for the 2001 Junior Rugby World Cup as they ended up in the number 3 position in the Colombo Asiad in 2000. Youths with a 3rd place finish qualified for the JRWC in Chile.

He started his club rugby career turning out for the CR and FC from 2003 to 2006 before crossing over to Kandy SC and playing for 6 more years ending his club career in 2012. He toured with the national teams for more than a decade till 2013 touring all the Asian countries plus UAE during his splendid career.

He started his coaching career with D.S. at Under-13 and later was a Forwards Coach at Isipathana before taking over the Under-16 outfit at his alma mater. From 2017 to 2019 he was the Assistant Coach at Joes. He took over the forwards coaching job at D.S. the following year and came back to Zahira as the Head Coach in his last stint.

Walpola will take over Thomian coaching from his schoolmate, Shamly Nawas who ended his term with the Mount Lavinia outfit.