Joes left with mountain to climb

St. Joseph’s College having lost the two opening games of the season has been left with a mountain to climb in Group A.

Led by full-back Rashane Gunawardane the boys from the Darly Road were stunned by Thomians last Wednesday (22-24) after their opening week’s loss (17-24) to a rampant Kingswood College.

“The results have not been great but, I cannot complaint a lot about the performance of the boys. Of course there were some mistakes which proved costly, but I am sure we can improve this team as the season goes on. Kingswood game was a tough one we knew because they have a very experienced team and our previous coach is now coaching them so probably they had a good idea about our strengths and weaknesses, but I am confident about these boys making a good progress,” St. Joseph’s head coach Dinesh Kumara told Daily Mirror.

In comparison to the St. Joseph’s sides which pushed on for the league title in the last few years, they have a very young squad to work with this time around.

“This year’s squad is very young and we lack experience a lot. They have played very little amount of games. We lost a lot of players after last season so we have to provide exposure for the players we have and look to improve them,” added Kumara.

Captain Rashane Gunawardane is keen on his team delivering a better performance in the upcoming matches and there is still no sign of giving up from the Joes.

“We didn’t have a good start of course. We have to admit that and give our best to turn the games around. We need to win remaining games with the bonus points and see where we could end. We are very much focused on the league right now, but we need to win the knockouts and sevens,” full back told Daily Mirror.

Daily Mirror Predictions:

Not many people would have predicted two defeats for Joes from their first two games, but now they have no other option but to upset one of the big teams in their groups. They should still squeeze into the top four of Group A.