THE Junior National squash team is moving full steam ahead with preparation and training for this month’s Junior Caribbean Area Squash Association’s (CASA) tournament.Chronicle Sport caught up with Coach Carl Ince who indicated that he is pleased with the level of commitment shown by youths.
“Preparations started well and are going well. We started a little late this time but we’ve caught up. We’ve covered all other aspects of the game and we are now at trying to get them match prepared – like fitness, technique, and tactics and so on, we’ve gone past that. I’m satisfied so far, we’re as prepared as we were in the other tournaments” Ince, who has been training national teams for several years now and has attended several regional tournaments, noted that many teams often underestimate their opponents, but this will not be the case with the Guyanese Unit.
“Competition gets harder each year, you can imagine that the other teams are fired up and motivated of course and they want to beat a team that has been winning for a number of years. This sometimes means that in our position, teams would get complacent. But I can assure you that we are not complacent. We know that they are gunning for us; we know how hard they would play and we’re prepared for it.”
The squad departs on the 14th for the tournament which gets going from July 17th- 26th in Barbados and includes at the Under 13 level for boys, Shomari Wiltshire, Samuel Ince-Carvahal, Demetrius De Abreu, Gianni Carpenter, Justin Lilico, Quinn Lilico, and Xavier Gordon.
At the Under 15 male level is Daniel and Anthony Islam while the Under- 17s have Ben Mekdeci and Alexander Cheeks. The Under- 19s have current Men’s & U19 as well as team captain Nyron Joseph and Alec Melville.
On the distaff end, at the Under- 13 level is Kirsten Gomes, Madison Fernandes, Haley Carpenter, Aliyah Persaud and Sage Gordon while at the Under-15 level is Makeda Harding.
The Under – 17’s have Rebecca Low and Sarah Lewis while the under 19’s have Taylor Fernandes, Larissa Wiltshire, Gabrielle Fraser and under 19 female champion and captain Akeila Wiltshire.
Carl Ince is assisted by Tiffany Soloman (Assistant Coach), Garfield Wiltshire (Manager) and David Fernandes (Assistant Manager). (Stephan Sookram)