Founded 2013 Origins Kandy | Location Colombo, Sri Lanka | |
Founder Dushan De Silva, Niroshan Goonawardena and Migara Maddumapatabendi Type Supporters Club For Trinity College Focus Support Trinity College Kandy on All Sport Activities | ||
Trinity Army is the largest organized supporters group in Sri Lanka. The objective of the group is to support any sporting event that ‘Trinity College Kandy’ participates in, with our main and largest gathering of supporters event being the Bradby Shield held in Kandy annually. The movement began with supporters gathering to cheer and encourage the Trinity College rugby team endorsing their ‘Trinity Army T-shirts’ at the venue. Rapidly gaining momentum the movement now reunites over 2,900 past pupils of Trinity College. An idea initiated by Dushan De Silva and brought alive with the support of Niroshan Goonawardena and Migara Maddumapatabendi, brought in over 1000 participants for the 1st leg of the ‘Bradby Shield’ held in Kandy on June 1, 2012, which was also the 1st organized event to bring together the ‘Trinity Army’. This is the first body to gather this amount of crowd donning one uniform T-shirt for the college sporting events and, the group is receiving mentoring services from Mr. Premasiri Maddumapatabendi who taught Trinitians for 25 years.
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The 1st Trinity Army Event
Bradby 1st Leg – June 1, 2013, Kandy This is the 1st successful event organized by the Trinity Army. Held at Pallekelle Army Camp with the adjoining ground Ayojanagama utilized to accommodate parking in numbers, the event recorded a massive turn out of over 1200 participants of which over 1000 were geared with the Trinity Army T-shirt. The event which began at 11 a.m. saw the march of the Trinity Army into the pavilion along with a 15-man ‘Papare’ ensemble. The event which was partnered/sponsored by RED FM, Odel, wow.lk, thescore.lk, Royal Mall, Rolling Stove, Lion Brewery, CTC, IDL and Pepsi provided the event with food and beverage and entertainment stalls on location. The organizers priced a special combo entrance pack at Rs. 2000, which included the official Trinity Army T-shirt courtesy of Odel, The Bradby match ticket, lunch from Royal Mall and refreshments. The Trinity College principal was able to secure 1100 tickets which were used as the special combo offer.
2nd Event
Bradby 2nd Leg – CR&FC – June 15, 2013, Colombo Driven from the major success of the 1st event and in response to the subsequent demand that followed the 2nd event was organized at the CR&FC Club grounds. The Trinity Army paraded from CR&FC to the Royal Complex with a 10-man ‘Papare’ band, which was covered by TheScore.lk, who was the official web media partner. The event commencing at 11 a.m. recorded a 500-plus Trinity Army participation at the end of play.
3rd Event
Knockout Final – Trinity College Vs. Wesley College – July 14, 2013, Colombo. Qualifying for the 3rd consecutive year for the President’s Trophy, the Trinity Army once again gathered troops to support the Trinity College 1st XV Rugby team at the Knockout Final held at CR&FC. The Trinity Army representatives invited the Trinity Rugby Body to collaborate with the event which united over 250 Old Boys.
4th Event
“Tap Me if you Can” Tap Rugby Tournament – October 19, 2013, Colombo. This event was created to strengthen the bond and relationship between inter-batch mates. Organized by the Trinity College batch of 2002 for four consecutive years its popularity and turn out has proven its continuing success.
‘Tap me if you can’ is the longest-running event organized by a single batch of Trinity College and it is the second longest-running event island wide in Sri Lanka done by a single batch. Tournaments held between 2009 and 2011 celebrated the participation of 10 batches, and in 2013 the batch of 2002 enlisted the collective support of the Trinity Army to take the event to greater heights. Directly resulting from the Trinity Army taking over, the event recorded many milestones in 2013:
Another 1st at the tournament was the giveaway of cash prizes along with the winning Shield. For the Winning Team Rs. 50,000, for the ‘Player of the Tournament’ Rs. 10,000, and for the ‘Most Valuable Player’ Rs. 10,000 was given out respectively.
5th Event
Bradby 1st Leg – CR&FC – May 10, 2014, Colombo The main Trinity Army event being the 2nd Leg of The Bradby Shield, the group arranged a small-scale get-together for its members to meet before marching out in signature Trinity Army style to the grounds. Members donned the previous year’s T-shirt, and a total of 500 were present for the event.
6th Event
Bradby 2nd Leg – 24 May June – Kandy The Trinity Army committee started preparation 3 months prior for the biggest event in 2014. This year too Odel became the official merchandize partner providing us with the T-shirt, bandana and a hand band along with Mendis & Co, Asia Pacific Brewery, CTC, Laugfs Holdings, Ceylon Cold Stores partnering the event. The much awaited annual event was located at the Army Camp in Pallekelle with BBQ, Mongolian, Fast Food, Ice cream stalls for consumption at convenience. 1,350 T-shirts were purchased and in those same numbers members merrily paraded to the Stadium accommodating the center stand behind the goal post specially reserved for the Trinity Army. During the live telecasting of the game on Channel Eye, the Trinity Army side of the stand was captured on several occasions with commentators referring to it as a “Sea of Red”.
A LinkedIn group was created with the interests of the group. Through this group they intend to find jobs and help better career paths for group members. http://www.linkedin.com/groups/TRINITY-ARMY-6535754?trk=my_groups-b-grp-v
Rugby team
Trinity Army rugby team is another solid initiative of the Trinity Army group to increase the camaraderie. Trinity has produced many great Ruggerites, but only few will continue to play for Clubs & Country due to the lack of financial gains you get through continuing. Its intention is to keep rugby alive in their lives, where they will still represent Trinity but in a less competitive manner so that they don't have to pick between sports vs career. In the longer run this initiative might be an outcome where Trinity can really form a club rugby team of its own and through the body itself find good careers for the players. This is a vision where we can work on. Trinity Army team is captained by 1999 Trinity 1st XV Captain Shanaka Yasaratne, and his deputy is Nuwan Wellalage, who was also the vice captain in 2001.
Trinity Army team comprises