The 145th Annual General Meeting of Kandy Sports Club will be held today Sunday (28) at 10.30 a.m. at the Gen. Denzil Kobbekaduwa pavilion at Nittawela. Two minutes silence will be observed in remembrance of members who passed away.
This Red, White and Blue coloured club was founded by a group of planters in 1874. At that time it was known as the Kandy Athletic, Boating, Cricket, Football and Dancing Club. The status changed fourteen years later in 1888, as Kandy Sports Club and started playing cricket, football, rugby, hockey, athletics and polo. They were housed at the Bogambara grounds and it stayed there till 1939.
After noticing the problem, the Kandy Municipal Council in 1949 leased the garbage dumping area at Nittawela to the Kandy Sports Club. By 1954 the club was transformed due to the untiring efforts of late Dr. K.B. Sangakkara, late Col. Stanley Ratwatte, Chandra Wijenayake, Stanley Martin and a few keen members. This was the beginning of Nittawela ground and the club house.
Today, thanks to ‘Mr. Rugby’ Malik Samarawickrema and the rest of the committee from 1992 the club is gifted with all what was needed, a modern club house, dressing rooms, tiers, restaurant, gymnasium and everything else. And the game of rugby became popular and Kandy SC had top class teams since 1992. They have been dominating the game let it be sevens, league or knockout. Today’s committee has everything that they need for a club. And also one can’t forget the good work done from 1992 by past president the late Dr. Sarath Kapuwatha. He had the unique achievement of being the president of the club on 20 occasions. It was under his presidency that the club was able to win their first trophy in rugby. The Club was fortunate to have excellent support of Platinum Sponsors - Cargills Ltd, and the other co-sponsors in Singer and Etisalate for their magnanimous sponsorship packages which gave the club the financial stability to help the players.
Kandy SC, along with CR & FC, Havelock SC, CH & FC, Dimbulla A & CC, Dickoya MCC, Uva and KV played in the first ever inter-club tournament in 1950, where Havelock SC became winners. It took Kandy SC 41 years to win a trophy. When the Clifford Cup tournament was five years old, Kandy SC entered the finals and lost to CR&FC in 1954. Then again in 1955 they met CR&FC in the final and lost. Then the next Cup final was in 1969, that year too they lost to CR & FC. The next Cup final was in 1978 and lost to Havelock SC. In 1992 Kandy SC won the Clifford Cup and in 1994 the League.
From this win, they have won the knock-out in 1992, 1993, 1995, 1996, 1997, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2007, 2008,2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2015, 2016, 2017 and 2018 and the league from1994, 1995, 1997, 1999, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2015, 2016-17, 2017-18 and 2018-19.