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| Sunday, 6 February 2005 |
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Kandy's International Sevens upgraded to Satellite status by lal gunesekera It was only last year (2004) that the International Rugby Board (IRB) upgraded Kandy Sports Club's Singer/SriLankan Airlines International Rugby 7s to that of a Rugby World Cup (RWC) qualifying event for Asia, but this year (2005) it has gone one step further by making the tournament an IRB Satellite event in the Asian region. A spokesman for Kandy Sports Club told the Sunday Observer that the IRB wanted 16 countries to compete this year, and have requested the organisers to add Hong Kong, Philippines, Pakistan and Macao into the list and also four countries from Europe. Last year's sixth edition of the tournament continued to be sponsored by Singer (Sri Lanka) Limited and SriLankan Airlines with the Connaissance Group as co-sponsors saw 12 sides in the frey. They were South Korea, Chinese Taipei, Japan, Singapore, Arabian Gulf, Malaysia, Guam, Thailand, Kazakhastan, China, India and Sri Lanka with Japan winning the Cup category beating Chinese Taipei 38-19, Khazakhastan the Bowl beating Guam 20-5 and Sri Lanka the Plate beating Arabian Gulf 31-19 in the final. Sri Lanka who beat India 54-17 at Bombay and Thailand 35-14 at Longden Place last year (2004) in the Asian qualifier (Pool 'A' Division 3) of the World Cup, are new scheduled to take on Thailand again on May 21 in Bangkok and Singapore on May 28 in Singapore in the next round. The 2005 season gets under way in Kandy on February 26 and 27 with the first of the three Singer 7s tournaments, while the second is scheduled for March 12 and 13 at Longden Place with the dates and venue for the third not yet finalised. On the international scene, Sri Lanka, are also down to figure at the Hong Kong Women's 7s in March. The first-round of the Caltex League Championship is down to be worked off from April 22 to July 10, while the second-round will be from July 15 to August 14. The Caltex Clifford Cup Knock-Out Championship has been fixed to be staged from August 26 to September 4. Kandy SC won both tournaments last year - the Caltex League for the eighth time since 1994 and the Caltex Clifford Cup beating Havelocks 51-20 in the final under Radhika Hettiaratchi. There is also the Pro 7s to be worked off in August to pick the National 7s squad for IRB 7s events for the years. |
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