Royal win Western Province Hockey Champions 2015

Friday, 13 March 2015 00:00 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

Royal Western province champs 2015 Royal College emerged unbeaten champions at the Western Province Hockey Tournament this year conducted by the Western Province Schools Hockey Association, beating D.S. Senanayake College by 4-2 in the finals worked out at the Astro Turf in Colombo last week. Royal beat Wesley College by 3 goals to nil in their opener with Nelaka Wedagama scoring two and Shaheer Bari sounding the board. Royal, which won the National School Games last year, then won against Sri Sumangala Vidyalaya, Panadura by 5-0 (Thineth Karunaratne 3 goals, Shaheer Bari 2 goals), beat St Benedict’s College by 4-0 (Thineth Karunarathne 2 goals, Shaheer Bari 1 goal, Malithra Yoshan 1 goal) in their round robin matches. In the quarter finals, Royal ousted Ananda College by 7-2 after leading by 4 goals to nil at the lemons. (Shaheer Bari 3 goals, Thineth Karunarathne 2 goals, Pasindu Charuke 1 goal, Anojan Ganesharajah 1 goal) and beat much fancied Nalanda College in the semi finals. Royal, coached by former Sri Lankan national coach Rohan Dissanayake, outclassed Nalanda by 6-0 comfortably with superior tactics in the game. They led by 3-0 at the half time. Thineth Karunarathne sounded the board twice, while Imaadh Dole, Shaheer Bari, Malithra Yoshan and Hasanga Liyanagunawardene scored a goal each. Royal in the final met defending champions D.S. Senanayake College, which edged out S. Thomas’ College, Mount Lavinia by 2-1 in their semi-final and ended the first half with 1-1. But the Colombo 7 school Royalists continued to dominate the field and outclassed their opponents to score 3 more goals while limiting the opponent team’s breakthroughs to one late goal. The final score stood at 4-2. With centre forward Imaadh Dole and the skipper Malith Rasanga scoring 1 each beside Thineth Karunarathne’s 2 goals. The team possesses 15 Western Province hockey colours men who are also College colours men. The team was led by Malith Rasanga who represented the Under 18 Sri Lanka team at the Junior Asia Cup and adjudged best player at the under 18 national schools games 2014 and coached by Rohan Dissanayake, whose commitment and dedication had won many titles for the Royal since 1991. The team had won had emerged champions in under 9, 11, 15, and under 18 over the years. This team has also emerged as All Island under 17 champions in 2013 and the National Schools Champions in 2014. They also remained on top throughout the entire season and even emerged victorious at the encounters played against teams from Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand during their tour end of last year.