Zahira awarded win after Trinity pulls out

Zahira College were officially awarded victory after Trinity College pulled out from their Inter-Schools Under-19 Division One League Rugby Tournament fixture, which was scheduled for Saturday at Maradana.

Zahira rugby authorities yesterday, confirmed to the Daily News that Sri Lanka Schools Rugby Football Association had awarded victory and full points after Trinity failed to turn up to the grounds citing medical reasons.

Earlier, the Trinity rugby authorities had written to the host school, Zahira and the Sri Lanka Schools Rugby Football Association (SLSRA) requesting for a postponement as they are unable to field their 1st XV with nearly 10 players down with suspected food poisoning.

However, Zahira informed Trinity that they cannot postpone the match since all arrangements have been made for the Group 2A tournament fixture and that there is no window in their calendar to play the game as per the tournament rules, all first-round matches need to be completed before July 31.

With this result and added six points, Zahira will now move up to sixth place in the final standings after the completion of the first-round matches behind Isipathana, St. Peter’s, Royal, St. Anthony’s and D. S. Senanayake. In fact, Zahira and D. S. Senanayake are level on points with 22 points each, but the latter is ahead on the points for and points against difference.

Zahira will also have the opportunity of playing in the President’s Trophy Knock-Out Tournament after they finished among the top eight teams of the league.

The final standings of the league tournament after the first round:

(1), Isipathana – 36 points. (2), St. Peter’s – 34 points. (3), Royal – 26 points. (4), St. Anthony’s – 24 points. (5), D. S. Senanayake – 22 points. (6), Zahira – 22 points. (7), St. Joseph’s – 19 points. (8), Trinity – 17 points. (9), S. Thomas’ – 17 points. (10), Vidyartha – 11 points. (11), Wesley – 10 points. (12), Dharmaraja – 9 points. (13), Science College – 6 points. (14), Kingswood – 2 points.