Dubai: While Dubai is set to celebrate 40 years of rugby in the UAE in a few weeks time, it is fitting that we Sri Lankans remember those fine players who played their part in making the game so popular and exciting to watch during its nascent years.
Ultimately, it was these unforgettable players who turned the event into what it is today; the season opener for the Sevens series in the world.
One such talented individual who lit up the Dubai International Rugby 7s tournament in the late '80s and early '90s was Roger Rodrigo from Sri Lanka, who played for the Dubai Exiles Rugby Football Club and Arabian Gulf teams with distinction from 1989 to 2000.
Rodrigo enjoyed an illustrious Rugby Football career in Sri Lanka, starting at the young age of seven, where he was nothing short of a legend while captaining his alma mater in 1983; then playing for two leading local clubs namely the CH&FC and Havelocks sports clubs, and finally playing for the Sri Lanka Police and the Sri Lankan National team spanning six glorious years of rugby from 1984 to 1989.
Rodrigo arrived in Dubai in 1989 and quickly joined the Dubai Exiles Rugby Football Club which was the leading club in the UAE and the Gulf. It didn't take long for him to stamp his class on the local rugby-playing scene. He was probably the only player to win the best player of the tournament award twice at the Dubai International Rugby 7s Tournaments, in 1990 and 1993.
The author is a Sri Lankan rugby enthusiast.
