Sri Lanka Rugby, the parent body affiliated to World Rugby, and Sports Minister Dallas Alahapperuma are in agreement that it is better to allow players to sit for their high school exam and restart the disrupted season in September-October instead of shifting the goal posts to salvage the remaining matches.
Ever since what promised to be a crackerjack of a schools League was halted in mid March after just two weeks, numerous have been the debates on whether to call off the 2020 season due to the coronavirus pandemic or postpone the championships.
“Our job is to promote rugby, especially the cradle and if there is a possibility of recommencing the schools League even if it means finishing the season in January, then we should go for it,” said Sri Lanka Rugby president and former schoolboy sensation Lasitha Gunaratne.
“This way we will not have to put the players under pressure and we can get rid of all the barriers. This could be a good idea.”
Gunaratne said he conveyed his thoughts to Minister Alahapperuma whom he said was “a nice person to work with” when the two men met at a site just outside Colombo in Diyagama on Tuesday where a sports university is to be constructed.
“Being the Minister who also looks after youth affairs he was very much in agreement,” said Gunaratne.
The conductors of the League, the Sri Lanka Schools Rugby Football Association, have also been positive of postponing what is left of the season until October as an option while hoping that full normalcy could return.
Most schoolboys in the fray were to play in their sign-off 2020 season hoping to catch the eye of club scouts for contracts but their passions and dreams were shattered by the coronavirus.
Crowd-pulling Royal College are the defending champions and its coach Dushanth Lewke said last month that he would need at least a month to re-condition and prepare his players at the announcement of a new date for recommencement.
But amid speculation of sport recommencing in the island, some critics have also raised questions on how a body contact sport like rugby can come to grips with what is being called “social distancing” unless the all-clear signal is given.
“I’d like to be the first person to say let’s play rugby even if it means next month. But the question is do we know about the plight of some parents of players who have been in lockdown without an income to enable their children recommence their sporting careers,” said a former player.
The schools League and the subsequent Knock-Out tournament bagged a seasonal kill of Rs.65 million in sponsorship from corporate superpower Dialog, a leader in the mobile phone service and television industry.
Part of the money was to be channelled towards player welfare with over a hundred schools playing rugby in various categories.