Royal College, Colombo and Visakha Vidyalaya, Colombo, who clinched the Colombo District hockey titles went on to take double honours when they emerged champions in the Under-15 All Island inter school girls’ and boys’ hockey tournaments at the Astro Turf, Reid Avenue, Colombo, recently.

Royal took sweet revenge when they beat Nalanda College in the finals having lost the title last year after a close tussle. The Royalist recorded a resounding win this time when they trounced the stickers from Nalanda by four goals to one after a forceful second half rally spearheaded by center forward, Shaheed Hussain, who went on to score two goals to place the Royalists in command following a one all deadlock at the breather.

The other two goals for Royal came courtesy skipper Malith Abeysundara and Musharaf Uvaiz. Nalanda salvaged some pride with a solitary goal which was made possible due to the efforts of Thusitha Sampath.

Earlier, the Royalist beat Isipatana 4-3 on penalty strokes after the match ended in a scoreless draw followed by a grand win against St. Thomas’ College, Matale, by five goals to nil in the quarters and semis respectively in the run up to the final.

Meanwhile, the Visakhians ran riot over Janadhipathi Vidayalaya Nawala as they trounced them by four goals to nil after leading 1-0 at the short whistle. This win was largely due to the efforts of star studded sticker and skipper, Manisha Welaratne who scored twice. The left extreme was well rewarded when she was honoured with the Most Outstanding Player’s award in the end. It was right inside Yelani Perera and left extreme Lakama Wijeratne who succeeded in their attempt at the goal to score the other two points. This was the fourth occasion where the junior stickers of Visakha made it to the finals and they succeeded in causing the downfall of the strong Seethadevi BMV Kandy, denying them the chance of winning the title for the fifth consecutive occasion, as the Visakhians defeated the lasses from Kandy in the semi final (2-0) with whom they shared honours last year, after defeating Museaus College by four goals to nil in the quarter finals.