Kavindu Perera a winger par excellence-by Upananda Jayasundera

Kavindu, the outstanding Rugby player. (Picture Upananda Jayasundera-Kandy Sports Spl.Corr)

Source:Dailynews

Kavindu Perera , an old boy of Vidyartha College,Kandy started playing rugby and he started his career in the Under 12 age category and his first coach was Nalin Wijesinghe. He played as centre at the start and later he played as winger and when he started playing for the First Fifteen he was coached by Anil Jayasinghe.

In the years 2012 to 2014 Kavindu played in the Carlton Super Sevens as a Schoolboy representing Central Kings and North Western Blacks and was the highest try scorer with nine tries. He started his professional rugby career in the year 2013 with Up-Country Lions and in the same year he played at the Club Sevens for Up-Country Lions along with Nigel Ratwatte, Srinath Sooriyabandara and Sashan Mohamed and won the Cup Championship. He was selected to the National Sevens Squad but not for the team After two years in the year 2016 , he played under Sudarshan Fernando and got selected for the Asian Series first fifteen and he was selected to the National Sevens Olympic Qualifying team to play in Monaco.

In 2017 he was selected to the National Rugby team under Omalka Gunaratne In 2016 and 2017 he participated in the Sri Lanka Super Sevens Series again representing Cargills Gladiators and KBSL Dragons.

In 2016,2017 and 2018 he played under Sudharshana Muththanthri and was selected to the Rugby Sevens team in 2018 for the Asian Games. He served one year with the Sri Lanka Army in 2014 after which he moved to CR & FC and captained the rugby team in 2017 and 2018. Then he moved on to his home town Kandy and joined Kandy Sports Club in the year 2019 and his intention is to continue playing for Kandy SC for a long time.

After joining Kandy SC he became the highest try scorer and became the most valuable player of the team and took part in the Mercantile Sevens representing Access Engineering. At present Kavindu is 26 years old and wants to continue playing rugby as long as he is fit enough to do so.