Sri Lankan coaches fly to New Zealand

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Coaches

Nine of the top local rugby coaches left the Island last night in order to participate in a six-day coaching and educational programme under the Hurricanes franchise in New Zealand.

This is the first time an initiative of this sort was brought to our coaches by Sri Lanka Rugby (SLR) and is one of the first steps taken in a long term rugby development plan island wide. The coaches’ stay in New Zealand will include sessions with some of the highly successful rugby personnel in the coaching department at the Hurricanes, which will be a boost and huge learning curve in their coaching careers.

Along with the ‘Get into Rugby’ programme, the aim of this initiative is to see growth in rugby throughout the country as these coaches are expected to assess the community development coaches of selected provinces upon their return.

However, although 10 selected coaches were expected to participate, only nine departed last night as St. Joseph’s head coach Nilfer Ibrahim excused himself from joining due to personal commitments.

The coaches who will be participating in this programme are Sudath Sampath, Asanga Rodrigo, Shamly Nawaz, Nalaka Weerakkody, Rajeev Perera, Saliya Kumara, Lasintha De Costa, Thanuja Weerakkody and Dilan Soyza.