Trinity edge out Royal in nail-biting thriller

By Shamseer Jaleel

Trinity College, the underdogs of the first leg of the 78th Bradby Shield encounter, pulled off a nail-biter of 17 points (1 try, 3 penalties, 1 drop goal) to 16 points (1 try, 1 conversion, 3 penalties) over Royal College at the Royal Sports Complex on Saturday.

At the short breather, it was Royal who led 13/8.

The packed stadium was treated to one of the best defence games which won the match for the Lions from the Central Hills. They hardly gave any gaping holes for the Royal outfit, who were shell shocked in front of their home crowd at Reid Avenue. 

Trinity showed some exciting moves by their three-quarters who looked threatening with their powerful moves. For Trinity, skipper Thisanga Dissanayake and Ravin Illangarathne in forwards play and Usman Safraz, Udeesha Rathnayake, scrum-half Udan Wijekoon, and fly-half Shan Althaf in the three-quarter line, stood out.

Royal, on their part, played well in the initial half, but ran out of ideas later in the second half, creeping up on errors which cost them in the end. Skipper Thivain Perera, Ayyash Shiyam, Idrees Farook, and Nabeel Yehya stood out for the Reid Avenue boys.

With a one point lead, Trinity prevailed; the battle is won but the war is yet to be won by the Lions, who will go flat out on 7 September at home, waiting for a decade now to secure the Shield.

Royal took the lead in the 11th minute of the game through an Idrees Farook penalty but Trinity equalised through a Shan Althaf penalty. Trinity, attacking through several phases, saw their fly-half Shan Althaf cross kick for their winger Murad Raizan to touch down for their first try. The Royal player escaped a card when he tackled the Trinity player both legs in the air before the try was scored. But the lead was short lived as Royal replied through a Fahaad Nazar try, and Idrees Farook added the extra two points to take the lead 13/8.

At the stroke of half time, Trinity stopped a Royal onslaught as they kept the Reid Avenue outfit away from scoring their second try of the match with some rock solid defence.

Come second half, Trinity was in complete control of things – Shan Althaf put over a 45 metre penalty to cut the deficit to two points. Althaf put over another penalty to take the lead 14/13. Shan, who had a grand game, put over a drop goal 40 metres away to take the lead further to 17/13. Idrees Farook, who too played an outstanding game for the home team, put over a penalty to cut the deficit to the bare minimum of one point and keep their hopes of bringing back the Bradby to Reid Avenue on 7 September alive.

Referee was Jaco De Vitt from South Africa.

In the Under-16 encounter, Royal beat Trinity 17/7. Under-14 was won by Trinity 17/10, and they also won the Under-12 B encounter 21/7. Meanwhile, Royal won the Under A game 33/20.

In another friendly game, D.S. Senanayake College beat Zahira College 36/19 in their R.I.T. Alles Memorial Trophy rugby encounter, which was played at Maradana last weekend.

Winners led 26/14 at the short breather.

Referee was Raveen Alexander.