Dilroy Fernando is undoubtedly one of the best international rugby referees Sri Lanka has ever produced. His talent with the whistle was first recognised by UL Kaluarachchi and later Ajith Abeyratne when he started blowing Isipathana’s junior games in 1988/89.
Having played for school, club and country in the pivotal fly half position with aplomb, he continued his love affair with the sport after retiring prematurely at the age of 25 after his appendix burst while playing.
Sidelined by the Sri Lanka Society of Rugby Football Referees (SLSRFR) in the past and spurned by Sri Lanka Rugby (SLR), Dilroy Fernando is like a prophet who is not recognized in his own land despite having a phenomenal record as a referee. The first Sri Lankan to be trained as a World Rugby Educator in 2001 in Dublin, Ireland, Dilroy achieved the rare distinction of officiating as an assistant referee at the 1998 Commonwealth Games final between Fiji and New Zealand in Malaysia, refereeing the 2002 Asian Games XVs final between Japan and South Korea in Incheon and being assistant referee during the 2009 Rugby World Cup Sevens in Dubai.
A World Rugby accredited Trainer, Match Commissioner and CMO/PR, he brought honour to Sri Lanka when he was conferred the ‘Match Officiating’ award by Asia Rugby (AR) in December.
He was presented with a gold whistle which was given to Nigel Owens as well. In fact, the Asian body considers “Dilroy Fernando as one of the biggest assets that we invested in and we will continue to use your services for our competitions and education across Asia. By any chance if your country does not need you, we definitely need your services,” an AR official stated.
He has conducted over 60 workshops in Sri Lanka, Match Officiating and Match Commissioner courses, WR training programs in 11 countries, refereed or been CMO/ Referee Manager in over 20 countries, officiated over 30 international Sevens tournaments and over 25 XVs Internationals.
Fernando lamented the fact that there are no Sri Lankans in the Asia Rugby top panel for the last eight to ten years.
“After I was selected by World Rugby, I took care of the referees’ training. We had eight referees in the Asia top, B and development panels. Today we have only two (Aaqil Jamaldeen and Dilum Deeshana) in the development panel,” said Fernando who has been officiating in Asia Rugby as a panel referee from 1997 to 2009.
A former president of SLSRFR, Fernando warned that Sri Lanka has only five top quality referees at the moment whereas during his time there were more than a dozen.
“At any given time we had 15 guys who could have easily run any ‘A’ division match. Myself, (Nizam) Jamaldeen, D Nimal, Aruna Jayasekera, AC Tennekoon, Gamini Indrasena, (Irshard) Cader, Priyantha Gunaratne, (Aruna) Rankothge, Asela de Silva, Dimithri Gunasekera, Priya Suranga and Rohan Fernando.
We had so many who could have done any ‘A’ division match without any problem. Today we are struggling. We don’t even have five. We have numbers about 80 odd but we don’t have quality,” he said.
It is unlikely that Fernando’s record of having blown 23 Bradby’s would be broken in his lifetime.
“Before I die I don’t think anybody will come close. I want somebody, some day to do it. It’s not easy doing it (Bradby) continuously. I was not a policeman on the field. I was there to manage and encourage boys to play a good game of rugby and spectators to enjoy,” said Fernando, 59, who is humble enough to learn from today’s referees.
“You can learn lessons right throughout as a referee. You have to face criticism. Still I am learning from these referees. I am humble enough to learn from a referee.
“Maybe I could be wrong in certain things. But if we think we know everything, it is not right,” said Fernando, who conducts online coaching sessions with referees regularly to review their performance at matches.
“We are having open dialogue with referees. I told them ‘Dilroy did an Asian Games final in 2002. After 20 years we have not got somebody refereeing a quarter-final’. For 22 years we haven’t got somebody refereeing at the Commonwealth Games,” said Fernando who wants to help up and coming referees.
“I want to put things right. I want a few people to serve in Asia Rugby and also to have at least 10 guys here who could do an ‘A’ division game. Last few years we have not done any training programme,” he said.
Fernando distinguished as a schoolboy in 1981 representing Havelocks in the Sevens and wearing the CR&FC jersey at the knockout tournament, before going on to captain the first ever unbeaten Isipathana team in 1982. He represented Sri Lanka at the 1984 Asiad in Japan before quitting the sport prematurely.
However, he began helping Isipathana with OWR Perera at a time when there were no rugby old boys committees.
“I was refereeing all the practice session and blew Isipathana junior matches because those days the Referees Society did not appoint officials for junior games,” recalled Fernando whose talent as a referee was identified by UL Kaluaratchchi who presented him a book ‘Art of Refereeing’ inscribing the words ‘Dilroy Fernando, with best wishes for an illustrious career in refereeing have fun ULK’.
“I still have it after 30 years. I was not even in the Society when I took up the whistle and started refereeing. Then Ajith Abeyratne said once I did Isipathana versus Trinity junior game ‘you are a damn good referee, why don’t you join the Referees Society?’ I applied and never heard from them,” he said.
However, the following year he was called up and given the opportunity to blow ‘A’ division club matches. Then he started serious refereeing and it was while working in Hong Kong from 1993 to ‘96 his transformation as a top referee took place.
“If I was working in Sri Lanka I wouldn’t have been able to do it as a referee. We never had monthly workshops. They had a semi-professional set up,” said Fernando who transformed the SLSRFR into a semi-professional body.
For all his experience, Fernando admits he had butterflies in his stomach before blowing the Asian Games final. “Especially when I was told I was refereeing the final. It was quite a challenging moment. I was quite young also,” said Fernando.