Sri Lanka U-20 Sevens outfit to defend title in HK

Sri Lanka is to defend its Asian Under-20 Sevens title in Hong Kong 

The Sri Lanka Under-20 Sevens outfit will defend their title at the Asian Under-20 Sevens 2017, which will be worked off at the Kings Park grounds in Kowloon on 4 and 5 August. 

Sri Lanka won the tournament last year under Peterite Kevin Dixon in the two-leg event played in Malaysia and Hong Kong. The outfit had some outstanding players such as Reza Rafaideen, Nishon Perera, Shamry Buhary, Omalka Gunaratne, Tariq Salih, Buddhima Piyaratne and Supun Dilshan. They went on to beat South Korea in the finals. Sri Lanka will be once again be coached by former Isipathana, Police, Kandy SC and Sri Lankan Sevens star Sudath Sampath. The side, which has some injury worries, will be announced with Supun Dilshan of Science College likely to serve as captain on the tour. Already 25 players are under training and eight players from the touring Under-18 side at the Commonwealth Youth Games in the Bahamas were included on this squad. After a few training sessions the final touring 12 will be announced later tomorrow. The winner of this event will earn a berth at the Junior World Rugby Sevens which will take place in Uruguay at the end of August. (SJ)

Men’s- Pool A - Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Taipei, China and the Philippines

Pool B - South Korea, Hong Kong, Thailand, Singapore and Uzbekistan

Women’s - India, Singapore, Uzbekistan, Malaysia, China, Hong Kong and Thailand

Sri Lanka Sevens squad to train in France 

The Sri Lanka Sevens squad of 12 players will get a unique opportunity to tour France for a three-day training program at a leading rugby institute in Paris. 

The Sri Lankan squad is likely to be captained once again by Dhanushka Ranjan, who led Sri Lanka to second position behind Hong Kong in 2016. 

The eight quarterfinalists from RWC Sevens 2013 in Moscow (New Zealand, England, Fiji, Kenya, South Africa, Wales, Australia and France) qualified automatically for the 2018 edition of the tournament as did the hosts the US. Four teams outside of those nine at the 2016-17 series - Scotland, Canada, Argentina and Samoa - are now confirmed. The remaining 11 places will be filled through regional competitions that will be held from June 2017 to April 2018 as follows: 

Europe (two teams) – Qualifiers: Russia and Ireland  Asia (two teams), Africa (two teams), North America (one team), South America (two teams) and Oceania (two teams) 

New Zealander Peter Woods will be the Head Coach of the Sri Lankan team with Inthi Marrikar serving as the High Performance Director. (SJ)