Orville Abeynaike Memorial Trophy retained for 9th consecutive year.
Royal winger Pasindu Charuke adjudged man of the match.

The 16th Annual Royal Thomian Hockey encounter for the Orville Abeynaike Memorial Trophy took place on the 30th of October with Mr. D. Gunawardana gracing the Colombo Astro Turf as the honourable chief guest for the evening. The side from Reid Avenue lead by Malith Rasanga were labelled the pre match favourites to emerge on top as the side was unchanged from the previous year when they beat the Thomians 3-0 for the Orville Abeynaike Memorial Trophy. However, Skipper Pasindu Wanigasooriya of S.Thomas’s was confident of matching their rivals and was seeking to lay hands on the trophy that had graced the halls of Royal College since 2007.

A packed Astro Turf stadium filled with enthusiastic fans of both teams saw the game kick off at 4.15 p.m. with the conclusion of Old Boys encounter for the Nihal Nilaweera Memorial Trophy with the Old Royalists emerging champions thanks to the solitary goal of the match by Tanvir Hallaj. After the Formal introductions and college songs of both schools the game was underway with referee W.M.C. Dissanayake sounding the whistle.

Early minutes of the game saw the Royal side dominate possession as usual with swift passing and positional play forcing the Thomians to sit back deep in their own half and negate the dangerous 5-man forward line that Royal is very famous for. The opening stages of the game saw the Royal forwards penetrate the crammed defensive line of the school by the sea but lacked the lethal finish to bother the scoreboard.

However a great move from the left field of Royal saw the ball being passed to the Royal Fresher Pasindu Charuka who single-handedly dribbled past 3 Thomian defenders to the base line and went one-on-one with the Thomian goalkeeper and squeezed the ball through the towering Thomian keeper to sound the board and put Royal in the lead on the 7th minute.

Soon after going behind the Thomians tried to counter attack on the break with the use of Shenal De Silva and the speedy No 7 D. Mahawanchakkana. The Royal half line commanded by Vindula Jayalath dealt well against the swift Thomian counter attack time and time again with great tackling by center half Nelaka Wedagama to the frustration of both the Thomian supporters and players alike. However a lapse in concentration by the Royal right back saw the Thomian No 7 steal the ball and go one-on-one against the Royal shot stopper S. Balendran who pulled off a superb diving save to deny a clear cut Thomian goal. Soon after, another mistake this time by the left back of Royal saw the Thomian striker gain another clear goal scoring opportunity only to once again be denied by S. Balendran who was proving to be a real menace to the Thomian frontline.

The dangerous Royal forward line was restricted to a miniature role in the first half as the Thomians pulled 9 men back and defended with numbers and great intensity. Realising that the Thomian defence is chock-a-block the Royalists started keep possession and gain fouls and create valuable penalty corners. Thomian Skipper P.Wanigasooriya was undoubtedly the saviour for S.Thomas’s as he pulled off great saves one after the other from the Royal set plays brining the first half to a close.

The Second half started off with the Royal forwards using their blistering pace and one touch passes to rattle the Thomians who had seemingly ‘parked the bus’ in front of their goal. However the Royal forwards finishing was quite wasteful and presented the Thomians with the ball many a time to counterattack towards the Royal goal. In the 39th minute Royal winger Thineth Karunarathna saw green by referee M. Naushad for intentional disrupting the flow of the game. With one man extra the Thomians capitalised and created a penalty corner which the Royal defenders could not deal with as D. Mahawanchakkana converted the corner to level the score 1-1.

With the scoreboards level and time ticking the game started to heat up as even the crowd chants started to get more verbal and deafening with both teams losing their cool and committing rash tackles which eventually lead to Royal Left half Vindula Jayalath being sin binned in the crucial stages of the game. With both sides missing plenty of their chances the game was poised head into extra time. However a move started by Royal left half who was back on the pitch after serving his time saw the ball be passed to Royal substitute Sajaad Irshad who crossed a bullet of a pass through the Thomian back line for it to be deflected by Pasindu Charuke of Royal College to put Royal back in the lead with 5 minutes left to go. The Royalists who sensed that the game had been won kept possession and ran the clock down to emerge the champions 2 goals to one at the 16th Annual Royal Thomian Hockey encounter.

Royal winger Pasindu Charuke was adjudged as the man of the match.