Sam Samarasekera, tough tackler with a repute-by Hafiz Marikar

Seevali ‘Sam’ Samarasekera is a former center-three-quarter who played as a top class player in the late 1960’s, 1970’s and 1980’s. Sam began his rugby career as a schoolboy playing for l Trinity College. He first played for the school under 15 team under the coaching of Asoka Weerasinghe and later played for under 17 team.

Popularly known as ‘Sam’ he was well known for his good tackling and ball handling. He first played for the school in 1968 under the captaincy of Ajith Abeyarthne and that year won rugby colors.

In 1969 Trinity captain Shafie and Sam booth were invited to play for Kandy Sports Club in the knockouts as school boys under the captaincy of Denzil Kobbekkduwa, who was their coach at Trinity College.

In 1970 Sam led the side and had players like Nihal R. Marambe, J.L. Weerasinghe, P.R. Balasuriya, R.V. Kulatunga, Irwin Howie, Tikiri Marambe, H. M de Silva, Cuda Wadugodapitiya, Y.S. Ping, R.N.R de Silva, Lalith Ramanayake, R. Madawela, R.J. Roberts, and R.G. Panaboke.

Under Sam’s captaincy Trinity won the Bradby first defeating Royal by 19 points to 3 at Longden Place. Then came the second leg in Kandy scheduled on July 17 at Peradeniya Campus grounds.

At last moment game was shifted to Nittawela grounds and Royal took a 6-0 lead in the fifteenth minute of the game. At this time the Trinitians were losing all the scrums and the lineouts and the Royalist were mostly in the Trinity territory.

A 40-yard penalty was awarded to Royal and Sourjah goaled it over to give his side a nine point lead.

With nearly ten minutes left to end the first half, skipper Sam started his fireworks. With few of his smart tackles Trinitians were able to stop Royal point hunt. When referee A. Cader blow the half time whistle Royal led 9 – 0. In the first lineout of the second half, Royal won the ball through Maiya Gunasekara, who held it clean and slipped it to scrum-half Weerasinghe, who gave it to Fred who charged down the blind side for another beautiful try by the left corner flag to give Royal a clear 12 points to nil lead.

With 14 minutes of play left, a penalty was awarded to Trinity from about 22 yards. Nihal Marambe came for the kick at goal. Irwin preferred a short tap and scrum half Tikiri passed to Irwin, from him to Roy, who knocked on with only twelve minutes left. Then came a penalty for a mistake made by Royal flanker Yusuf. Nihal made no mistake with the kick, Royal 12 – Trinity 03.

Few seconds later Trinity’s scrum half Tikiri made a break and gave the ball to Irwin, who gave a reverse pass to skipper Sam and he made ground and gave the ball to winger Jayantha who touched down by the corner flag. Nihal Marambe did his best to goal it, but failed, Royal 12 – Trinity 06. With eight minutes to the final whistle, Sam collected the ball and gave it to Tikiri, from him to Irwin who dummied several times and changed direction and gave it to center Roy, he ran a few yards and slipped the ball to winger Rohan Kulatunga who grabbed the ball and dashed nearly 50 yards to score a neat try for the home side and Nihal kicked correctly to give the extra points Royal 12 – Trinity 11.

With only about two to three minutes left, Sam took the ball into the Royal territory and gave a long pass to winger Jayantha, who had an open field and scored a the winning try for trinity with Nihal adding extra points. Final score Trinity 16 – Royal 12. Sam also played for the Outstation School team and was to lead the Combined Schools team but had to keep off due to a shoulder injury.

Soon after school in 1971 he played for the Kandy Lake Club team, and in 1972 joined Police and played till 1977.

He was tipped to lead he side but due to some misunderstanding he didn’t get the break. He was in the Police Clifford Cup winning team for a number of years.

Sam was in the first Police Cup winning team led by Anton Benedict along with some Kandy players such as the brilliant wing-three-quarter Bandula Wijesinghe of (Nugawela Central College), Seevali Palitha Sam Samarasekara (Trinity College and Kandy SC) P.S. ‘Rock’ Banda of (Poramadulla Central), P.S. Kularathne (Vidyartha College), R.M. Lafir (Vidyartha College and Kandy SC), Nimal Lewke (St. Sylvester’s and Kandy SC), Daya Jayasundara (Dharmaraja and Kandy SC), The Kurunagala’s Nimal Abeyasinghe (St. Anne’s College ) and S. Somachandra (Gampola Central). During Sam’s days in Police he helped school teams like Thurstan College and D.S. Senanayake College.

He left Police in 1977 and vacated the game in the following year. Then in 1979 he joined Kandy Sports Club and played the full season. In 1980 Sam played two games and said good bye to rugby.

While playing for Kandy SC he coached Kingswood College in 1980 and the Trinity under 15 in 1981.

He played for the Sri Lanka team under Hadji Omar along with players like Y.C. Chang, Didacus de Almeida, Anton Benedict, Daya Jayasundera to name a few. He played as center-three-quarter with teams like ‘Bosuns’ and Paris University. He played club rugby for almost a decade and was known for his scorching runs and terrific tackles. He was a tower of strength to any side he played. His father H. Samarasekara was too a top rugby player played for Trinity in 1934 and later officiated Kandy schools and Lake Club “B division games as a referee.