Navy, Kandy in Clifford Cup final
Sailors humble CR 19-12:
by Ranjan ANANDAPPA
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CR & FC’s Zulki Hameed in a desparate attempt to halt
penetrative move by Navy SC’s Namal Rajapaksa, Pic. Kavindra
Perera.
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A sensational try during extra time by scrum half Suranga
Pushpakumara put Navy into the final of the Clifford Cup after 21 years
beating the fancied CR & FC by 19 points (1 goal, 2 drop goals and 2
penalties) to 12 (4 penalties) in the semi final match played at the
Royal College Sports Complex grounds yesterday.
After a series of penalty shoot outs with both sides on par 12-12 at
full time Navy's Pushpakumara found their elusive victory formula off a
line out which was punted ahead and Pushpakumara picking up the ball
pierced the 'CR' defence to touch down under the post. Dev Anand who
earlier kept the sailors' hopes flickering putting over 2 penalties and
a couple of his famous drop kicks, also put over the easy conversion.
Nothing sensational occurred during the entire match besides the `Red
Shirts' trying desperately to break the strong shackles provided by the
Navy. In a hard fought compulsive battle `CR' three quarters were kept
under control by the Navy forming a fortress like defence with Chula
Susantha, Nilufa Ibrahim, Nuwan Hettiarachchi playing tirelessly.
CR & FC back division fly half Niroshan Fernando, centres Nigel
Ratwatte and Shabbir Mohammed and winger Vishwamithra Jayasinghe were
not permitted to dominate.
The `red shirts' opened scoring through a penalty put over by Reza
Mubarak and there after it was a contest of penalty shooting with both
CR and the Navy. For the Navy drop kick specialist Dev Anand dropped two
kicks and made no mistakes with the penalties that came his way,
Navy led 9-6 at the breather.
At full time the scores were level 12-12 and the first ten minutes of
extra time was enforced by the referee Allan Mithchom. Navy who won a
line out close to the 'CR' territory saw scrum half Suranga Pushpakumara
giving them the much wanted win.
Navy previously featured in two Clifford Cup finals in 1976 losing to
Havelocks 3-15 under Ilex Perera and in 1989 they lost to CR & FC 3-6.
captained by late P. Samaraweera. Navy will now meet Kandy SC in the
final on July 31 at the Bogambara Stadium. |
