FOLLOWING Guyana’s participation in the Men’s and Women’s NACRA Sevens Championships and Olympic Qualifiers in North Carolina two weekends ago, they met with the media yesterday at Olympic House to give a detailed debriefing of what played out.The Men’s national side finished fifth of the nine teams that participated while the Women were sixth out of the eight competing teams.
Head coach of the Men’s team, Theodore Henry, believes his players were not completely focused in the matches and that is one of the contributing factors which led to their loss of the Sevens title.
Henry said, “USA and Canada were clearly the strongest sides in the tournament but we were the best, right after them. Our guys were prepared physically, tactically and even mentally but application on the field wasn’t there from a few of the players.
“This loss falls completely on the shoulders of the players,” the coach added.
He disclosed that after the first match which they won 38-19 against Bahamas, they became complacent and it reflected in the score line of the other matches that the locals were undone due to poor defensive efforts.
The turning point in the NACRA leg of the competition occurred when Guyana lost controversially to Cayman Islands. Cayman Islands then lost to Mexico in the NACRA Sevens final 5-21 while Guyana humbled Jamaica 19-5 to take fifth. That loss also put Guyana out of contention to qualify for the Olympics.
President of the Guyana Rugby Football Union (GRFU), Peter Greene, pointed out that preparing for both the NACRA 15s and Sevens Championships, which are now hosted closer together, took a toll on Guyana’s top players which means the union must produce more players.
Meanwhile, Henry thought that the Women put forth a very good performance even after being out of competitive rugby for a few years.
He saw the side get progressively better in the tournament after ironing out a few jitters but their inexperience showed.
Team manager Petal Adams also thought the ladies put on a good show and have given the union good signs for the future of women’s rugby.
Guyana’s Men now turn their attention to the 2015 Pan Am Games in Toronto, Canada from July 11-12.
A squad of 12 was named with Vallon Adams and Travis Bascom being replaced by Akeem Fraser and Phibian Joseph.
The rest of the squad reads: Richard Staglon (captain), Lancelot Adonis, Claudius Butts, Avery Corbin, Rickford Cummings, Ryan Gonsalves, Peabo Hamilton, Patrick King, Ronald Mayers and Dwayne Schroeder.
Guyana will be competing in Pool ‘B’ which includes the mighty Argentina, Canada and Brazil while Pool ‘A’ consists of USA, Uruguay, Chile and Mexico. At the conclusion of the pool matches, teams will be positioned in their pools as determined by competition points and will battle in the quarterfinal round to advance.
Prior to the Pan Am Games Guyana will have gained some game-situation practice when they compete in a Pre-Pan Am Games Mini Tournament which features three other teams.
The four-team tournament sanctioned by Rugby Ontario includes Ontario Blues Senior Provincial Rugby 7s, the Uruguay International Sevens team and the Pro-North American Team which is an invitational team.
The competition is scheduled for July 4 at the Appleby College, Ontario.

By Kizan Brumell