By A Special Sports Correspondent

Isipatana huffed and puffed before pulling off a sensational 25-20 win over S.Thomas’ College during extra time in their semi-final rugby encounter of the President’s trophy knockout tournament worked off at Royal Sports Complex on Sunday (September 8).

Isipatana once again pulled off victory from the jaws of defeat thanks to a last gasp try by playmaker Shaahid Zumri as the two teams were stretched to go into extra time. The scores were deadlocked at 20 all at the long whistle of referee Pradeep Veheranga. The tournament organisers gave instructions to play two sessions of five minutes each to find a winner and the green shirts prevailed over S.Thomas’; producing the match winner in the first session of extra time. Isipatana will now meet St. Peter’s in the schools’ knockout final which is scheduled for September 15.

The Thomians dominated play in both halves and led Isipatana during most parts of the game. Isipatana had their tails up for a brief period in the first half with an early try by Abdullah Faizer, but the Thomians came back aggressively with a try by M. Karunaratne and a penalty by skipper Yehan Bulathsinhalage to lead 10-7 at half time.

S.Thomas’ played their hearts out in the second half and earned an important try through Udan Bulathsinhalage. The lads from Mount Lavinia also managed to turn pressure into points through a penalty which was kicked right by their skipper. But Isipatana were breathing behind their backs and found their way back into the game through tries by Nimantha Sandeepa, Kavin Tharusha and eventually Zumri which helped Isipatana save face and record a sensational come from behind victory. Amazingly the green shirts were down to 14 players in the final 13 minutes of the game when Kalindu Shenal was sent off for dangerous tackling.

On Saturday, St. Peter’s qualified for the schools knockout tournament final by beating Wesley in the other semi final which was worked off in Colombo. The Peterites beat Wesley by 23 points to 20.

Althaf dazzles in Trinity’s Bradby Shield win

Trinity College ended a nine- year wait to clinch the converted Bradby Shield when they beat arch rivals Royal College in the second leg of their annual rugby encounter at Pallakele Stadium on Saturday (September 7). The game was tagged as the 78th encounter in rugby between the two schools.

The winners relied heavily on the boot of kicking sensation Shaan Althaf who took the mantle of leading from the front and bringing victory to his team. Althaf contributed 20 points in a Trinity score of 25 which comprised one try, one conversion and six penalties. Royal responded with two tries, two conversions and three penalties and even led at half time with a score of 20 points against 13 by Trinity.

Trinity also won the first leg played in Colombo with a score of 17 points against 16 by Royal and had a total aggregate of 42 points against 39 by Royal in this edition of the series. Trinity last won the shield before this memorable game -played on Saturday -when they were led by Tharinda Ratwatte in 2014.

There were moments in the second half where it looked like Royal would prevail over the host team, but Trinity’s Althaf changed all that with a well taken monster of a penalty from 53 metres out and followed that up with his sixth and final penalty to seal the game for his team.

The solitary try scorer for Trinity was Minula Yaddehige who crossed the Royal goal line in the first half.

The players who impressed for Royal were Yowan Pathirana and Ayyash Shiyam, who touched down once each while Idris Farook and Nabeel Yehiya did the honours for Royal in the kicking department.