Friday, 19 July 2013 03:54
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World’s fastest and most capped sevens players to feature for the Sabaragamuwa Stallions at the 2013 Carlton Super 7s
Sabaragamuwa Stallions, one of the founding franchises of the Carlton Super 7s, announced the signing of Uale Mai and Carlin Isles to the team for the forthcoming international leg of Sri Lanka’s premier rugby tournament.
Carlin, who represents the USA, is currently the world’s fastest rugby player. He transferred to rugby from athletics in 2012 and has quickly established himself as one of the most exciting players of the 7s format. As a former 100 metre sprinter, he was ranked 36th in the USA ahead of last year’s Olympics although, had he competed, his personal best time of 10.13 would have got him a place in the semi final. He has also raced against US sprinters Tyson Gay and Justin Gatlin.
Carlin will join several high-profile islanders and experienced 7s players to the Sabragamuwa Stallions Stable including legendary former Samoan captain Uale Mai. A recipient of the IRB 7s Player of the Year award, Mai will double up as coach/player for the Stallions.
Playing alongside Mai will be two of his fellow countrymen – Afa Aiono and Faatoina Autagavaia. Aiono is the current Samoan 7s skipper and has been selected to IRB’s 2013 7s Dream Team, while Autagavaia plays in both formats for his country. The Samoans won’t be the only Pacific Islanders to feature for the Stallions with both Levani Botia (current Fiji sevens captain) and Neumi Lagilagi also included in the squad.
The team will be skippered by Rohitha Rajapaksa, who was appointed ahead of the local leg of the tournament. Rajapaksa has proven experience and on field leadership as both current captain of Navy rugby team and former skipper of S. Thomas’ College First XV, while also counting racing as one of his hobbies.
The rest of the Stallions domestic team comprises of Banuka Nanayakkara (NAVY), Chula Susantha (NAVY), Thisia Karunathilake (NAVY), Andrew Benson (NAVY), Richie Dharmapala (NAVY), Thishan Wickramasinghe (CH), Devinda Prasad (NAVY) and Shabeer Mohamed (NAVY).
Sabaragamuwa Stallions is managed by NSports Ltd., a national franchise of Sri Lanka’s elite rugby 7s competition, Carlton Rugby 7s. The franchise is owned by Nimal Perera who is the Managing Director of Royal Ceramics, Chairman of Pan Asia Bank and Deputy Chairman of Vallibel One.
