Joe-Pete soccer encounter today
The flags of St. Joseph’s and St. Peter’s College will flutter in the breeze that will waft across the CR and FC ground, Longden Place when the two colleges kick-off for their 25th Silver jubilee Soccer encounter for the Stanley De Silva Challenge trophy today (October 23). Kick-off will be at 4.45 p.m. Of the matches played to date, St Peter’s leads the tally with 12 wins to St. Joseph’s 11, while one year both teams emerged joint champions.
The winners of this year’s encounter will keep the Stanley De Silva trophy for keeps, while a new trophy named after two former Rectors of the two schools Rev. Joe, Wickremasinghe and Rev. Stanley Abeysekera will replace the former trophy in future games.
Apart from the senior match, an under 13 fixture will be played for the Rev. Noel Perera Challenge Shield, the under 15 team will battle it out for the Rev. Stanley Abeysekera Challenge Shield and the Old boys will turn the hands of the clock for the Rev. Joe, Wickremasinghe Challenge shields.
St. Joseph’s took the initiative to organize an Annual Soccer Encounter with their traditional rivals St. Peter’s, with the first encounter being played in 1989. A little known fact is that the match was actually played on January 17, 1990. Generally both schools take turns in organising the match each year. Apart from 1992 and 2014 when the match wasn’t played due to unavoidable circumstances the encounter has been going on uninterrupted for the last 24 years. The Stanley De Silva Challenge Trophy is awarded to the winners of the match.
Sudath Karuantillake of St. Joseph’s and Dinesh Pereira of St. Peter’s had the honour of leading their schools in the first ever big match. Balendra Anthony coached the Josephian team with former Rector Rev. Sylvester Ranasinghe was the Prefect of Games as well as the Chairman of the Organising Committee at that time with Joseph S. Pius being the Masterin-Charge. Likewise Milory Perera coached St. Peter’s with Chrishan Jayawardene being the Master-inCharge. The Chief Guest was Senior DIG Nalin Delgoda an old boy of St. Joseph’s. -
BM