A dominant final 3rd single by the national under 18 champion Avindra Perera saw S. Thomas’ College Mount Lavinia winning the Under 19 Public Schools’ Championship defeating Colombo International School (CIS) in the finals after a close contest.
The Under 19 championship that commenced last Monday saw Royal College, Colombo International School, Ananda College and S. Thomas’ College ending up in the semi-finals. Royal College weren’t able to make it past CIS in the first semi-final, while making their way in the other semi-final was S. Thomas’ defeating Ananda College.
The finals that commenced at the Sri Lanka Tennis Association playing courts gave the Thomians the first luck of the draw as Viranka Fernando defeated Savant Gamage 6-2, 6-0. Moving forward to the 1st Doubles, CIS registered their first win as Sebastian Sansoni and Dulitha Ellawala lost out to to the CIS doubles pair led by Aadhavan Pushparaj.
Fighting their way back into the competition, STC went on to win the 2nd Single defeating Sheal Karunaratna of CIS 6-0, 6-2. With the 2nd doubles being the decider for both teams, it was Amandha Gunawardena and Naadir Nazar who took CIS to victory.
After winning the first set 5-7, the Thomian pair Senaal Hemakumara and Thuvaragan Sabesan staged a comeback in the set #2 to win it 6-3 but it did not prove to be sufficient to stop CIS from winning the draw as the final set score read 6-2 in favour of CIS.
With both teams equalling their win tally, the victory narrowed down to the final 3rd Single and playing for glory, Avindra Perera of S. Thomas’ defeated Joshua Jayaratne 6-1, 6-2 to take his team to the title.
With the conclusion of the under 19 tournament, the All Island Public Schools’ Tennis Championship comes to a close; the All Island Schools’ Under 19 tournament is expected to take place in September this year.
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