Sri Lanka’s rugby skipper of the 15 a side version of the game and Hambantota district MP Namal Rajapaksa is quitting rugby in all forms of the game in 2014.
“This will be my last rugby season and most probably my last international season but it is most likely that I will be playing the five nations (A5N) tournament this year which will be my last international tournament. I have taken this heart-rending decision due to the pressures of my political life,” Sri Lanka’s 27- year-old first son told ‘Ceylon Today’ last night in a very hurried and abrupt interview while embarking on his evening jogging and fitness training session.
“I have played for Navy and Sri Lanka for four years, and a good player must know when to quit,” he said.
Meanwhile, President of the Sri Lanka Rugby Football Union (SLRFU) Asanga Seneviratne expressed grave disappointment at Rajapaksa’s decision to quit the game.
“This is indeed a great disappointment if he has decided to quit the game as he has a lot more number of years left in him for rugby. He will be certainly an asset to the Sri Lanka side at any time. This is the time that we are trying to take Sri Lanka to the world and we are in the process of getting there. It is really important that, Namal is a part of these endeavours,” Seneviratne said.
Rajapaksa has rewritten schools, club and national rugby record books with his two younger brothers Yoshitha and Rohitha. The trio, in 2005,2006 and 2008, respectively, have equalled a Thomian rugby record where three brothers captained the “school by the sea” after the three Samarasinghe brothers- Nihal (Baila) Samarasinghe (1960), Maithree ( 1963) and Rajpal Samarasinghe (1972). The trio also created another club record when they captained Navy SC. Namal skippered the Navy in 2010 and 2011 while Yoshitha captained Navy in 2013 and Rohitha in 2013 and 2014, the latter year when Navy clinched the Dialog Cup.
Namal is also the first ever instance of a MP in any part of the world to have played international rugby. He and his brother Yoshitha are the only instance in world political history where two sons of a Head of State have captained their respective country at international rugby.
