Young guns on fire at RCGC Championship 2020

Yannik Kumara

Kayla Perera

Silver Division winner Tharanga Gunasekera receiving the award from RCGC Vice Captain Jehaan Ismail

Rusi Captain receiving the Runner-Up award - Pix by Lasantha kumara

• 14 year old Yannik Kumara beats veteran Rusi Captain
• Ladies College student Kayla secures women’s contest

By Shamseer Jaleel reporting from RCGC

Yannik Kumara

Kayla Perera

Fourteen-year-old young golfer Yannik Kumara of British School of Colombo and Kayla Perera of Ladies College stamped their class at the Royal Colombo Golf Club (RCGC) 2020 Club Championship event which ended yesterday.

In fact Yannik missed out from becoming the youngest in the history of RCGC winners list by a mere three months. The record holder is Amrith de Zoysa who won at the age of 14 years and six months. More than 150 golfers teed off in their annual club event which took place for four days.

After the initial day’s play Sachin de Silva secured top seeding with Yannik Kumara seeded second, Shamal Perera was third seed and veteran Rusi Captain, the veteran with 14 wins under his account was 4th seed. 

Captain beat Nirekh Tejwani and Sanjay Wettimuni on his way to the final encounter. Meanwhile the young schoolboy Yannik Kumara beat Chandana Gunasekera, Arvind Fernando and Chanaka Perera to walk in to the final encounter.

Both Yannik and Rusi dished out Champaign golf in the two rounds of the finals. In the end the young 14 year old Yannik stamped his class by beating the veteran of 14 club championship wins under his belt, Rusi Captain.

Anouk Chitty met Kayla Perera in the Ladies’ Club final. Kayla Perera beat Kaya Daluwatte while Anouk Chitty beat Arika Wickramasinha in their respective semi-final encounters. After a superb round of golf Ladies College girl, Kayla Perera won the event once more after a lapse of one year.

In the Silver Division once again in tandem former Trinitian Tharanga Gunasekera was in sparkling form continuing his good work where he left at the Nuwara-Eliya Golf Club event, when he won the Silver Division with a net score of 140 followed by Liu Qiyun who netted 141.

Bronze division was won by Maj Gen Jagath Gunawardena with Prof. A.H. Sherifdeen becoming runner-up. Bandula Weerasinghe accounted for the Master’s division with Michael Beamish becoming runner-up.

Senior division encounter saw Chamath J. Kulasinghe winning tittle with Christopher Dias taking home the runner-up trophy. Ladies Bronze Cup was won by V. Fowler Watt with Fran de Mel being the runner-up.