Ceylonese Rugby & Football Club (CR&FC) began rebuilding their shattered image with a memorable 24-6 win against Army Sports Club in a Cup Championship fixture of the Caltex Inter-club league rugby tournament at Longden Place yesterday.

CR&FC did well to record a win after last week’s shock defeat at the hands of Navy Sports Club. They were also forced to play sans some of their regulars yesterday.

The Red Shirts were minus Chamara Vithanage, Dhanushka Perera, Mohammed Jabbar and Dev Anand (the latter has joined Navy SC) but managed to get the better of the exchanges and score three well earned tries. CR’s points came in the form of three tries, three conversions and a penalty while Army SC played in patches to earn two penalties.

CR’s Ashen De Costa, who filled the void left by Anand at the fly half’s position, had a good game while number eight Dushanth Lewke was in the thick of all moves initiated by the forwards.

CR were forced to defend in the first 15 minutes of the game due to a severe onslaught by the ‘soldiers’. But they did well to hit back during a tackle situation where they won the ball and set up winger Dinesh Kumara to score. Full back Mubarak made a good conversion to put CR 7-0 up.

CR played a lot better than last week as the game progressed and earned another three points through the boot of Mubarak before the two teams crossed over for half time.

There was some coordination between CRs forwards and backs and host team took control of the game as the game stretched into the second half.

Army’s Kapila Knowlton knocked over a penalty to give Army their first points with the second half four minutes old.

Army seemed to struggle to retain possession as the game progressed and gave away some unwanted penalties.

CR played a controlled game in the second half and had the better of the exchanges in the set pieces.

Pushing their way forward with their hard working forwards, the host team earned a try when a series of quick short passes took Ashan de Costa over the try line.

CR’s centre Lasintha de Costa then made a brilliant 40 metre run and was ready to score when he tripped and fell inches from the try line. He sprained a calf muscle in the process and failed to play any part in the game thereafter.

Army responded with a penalty by Kumara soon afterwards.

The game came to an abrupt halt due to both sets of players engaging in a brawl.

After the game was resumed, CR’s skipper Ashen Karthelis smashed his way over the try line. Mubarak was spot on with the kick to make his team’s score read 24 as against 6 by Army.