Sri Lanka wins Asian Rugby Championship Division I

By Shamseer Jaleel

The Sri Lankan rugby team, under the dynamic leadership of Fly Half Fazil Marija, beat hosts Philippines (27-14) at the Asian Rugby Championship (ARC) Division I in the Philippine capital of Manila two days ago. 

This is the second occasion that the former South African and Kandy SC Head Coach Johan Taylor guided the national team to the Division I crown. In 2010 he led Sri Lanka to the Top 5 with a win over Singapore in Singapore. Kazakhstan secured third place with a 32-12 win over Singapore.

Sri Lanka was the only team to end the tournament without being punished through any disciplinary action. The national team will now await the winners of the encounter between South Korea and Hong Kong on 16 May in Incheon, South Korea. Sri Lanka will play an away encounter on 6 June in order to determine which teams will be promoted and demoted for next year’s tournament. Presently it looks like Sri Lanka will need to play Hong Kong in Hong Kong which will not be an easy task. But it will give the coolheaded Taylor three more weeks to prepare for this game.

Marija, Dulaj Perera, Kanchana Ramanayake, Dhanushka Ranjan, Lavanga Perera, Kishore Jahn and Reza Mubarak played well during the two-match tournament. “This was a super tournament with the boys playing as one unit. After a tough and long season, all the boys were in peak form and gave their best. We were guided by our coach Johan Taylor, who is known for his tactical moves and calmness, and never cracked under pressure. The boys overcame many shortcomings in the opening game against Kazakhstan and played well within themselves to achieve this win over the hosts. Now we will have nearly three weeks to prepare for our next game either against South Korea or Hong Kong,” Marija said. 

Marija added that there was a huge gap between Sri Lanka and the top three teams - Japan, South Korea and Hong Kong. He suggested that the only way to negate this skill disparity was to have more match practice.

Japan continued their winning streak at the Asian Rugby Championship Top Three division when they beat South Korea 66-10 to secure the trophy with one more game to go. South Korea will battle it out for second place against Hong Kong in a home game next weekend. Japan’s women too maintained their winning ways by beating Kazakhstan in the final.