Bradby Shield: Royal take commanding first leg lead

Royal player well held by a Trinitian

By Shamseer Jaleel reporting from Pallekelle

A magnificent second half rally took Royal through to a 34 points (5 tries, 3 conversions, 1 penalty) to 17 (3 tries, 1 conversion) win over Trinity College in the first leg of the 75th Bradby Shield encounter on Saturday, worked off at a half empty Trinity College Rugby Stadium in Pallekelle.

Trinity played well in patches scoring first in both halves of the game. They played some outstanding rugby for most of the first half but failed to add points, with Miranga Subasinghe off his game missing nearly 10 points for Trinity through kickable penalties and conversions at goal.  

Trinity Centre Harsha Samarasinghe looked threatening with some powerful moves but lacked support from the rest. He also provided one of the highlights of the game covering nearly 80 meters before scoring. Trinity skipper Reshan Bandaranayake however was well-marked man and as such was given little room to run. Amith Kulatunge meanwhile had to leave the field after being tackled high by a Royal player, who was lucky to go free without a card.

For Royal, both Skipper Thulaib Hassen and Lehan Gunaratne had an outstanding game, with the pair rock solid throughout and their powerful moves proving a handful for Trinity.

Early in the game, it was Kalindu Nandila’s clearance kick that fell into the safe hands of Trevin Karunanayake who was then able to draw first blood for Trinity. But Trinity’s joy was short lived as Royal hit back immediately through Hassen when Trinity winger Geeshapa Kulatunge failed to clear the ball, though Dulan Gunawardena was off target with conversion. 

Achitha Radeeshan touched down Royal’s second try when Miranga Subasinghe failed to clear the ball to touch, instead kicking it infield straight into Achitha’s hands. Dulan Gunwardena added the extras to increase Royal’s lead to seven, while another Dulan penalty took Royal further ahead at 15/5. Trinity hit back on the stroke of half time with Trinity deputy skipper Dhiren Ratwatte going over for a try. Subasinghe added the extras to reduce the gap to 3 points.

After the turn around Trinity took the lead through Samarasinghe’s moment of individual brilliance but the relatively easy conversion was missed by Subasinghe. Two Lehan Gunaratne tries and one by Kevin Samarasekera took Royal to a 34/17 win. 1956 Trinity player Mike de Alwis was the Chief Guest. Aaqil Jamaldeen refereed the game.

Royal will have a handy 17 point lead going in to the second leg on 15 June at Royal Sports Complex. In the last 4 decades only once has a Trinity side won the Bradby Shield after losing the first leg. That was under Murad Ramzeen’s in 2011 when Royal won the first leg 33/25 but the Lions stormed back in Colombo with a huge 40/5 win.

Elsewhere, Trinity took a commanding 31/5 win in their Under 18 encounter played for Simithrarachchi Trophy, while in the Under 16 encounter Trinity won 5/0.

Royal 34 points

Trinity 17 points

Pix by Chamila Karunaratne

Trinity skipper Reshan Bandaranyake about to kick