THE National Sports Commission (NSC) recently presented the Guyana Table Tennis Association (GTTA) with $1M, which will go towards Guyana’s participation at the Pan American Senior Table Tennis Championships.

The GTTA will be sending a six-member team to the event that is set for Lima, Peru, from November 13 to 19.
According to GTTA, Guyana’s men’s and women’s teams have gained qualification to the Pan American championships as a result of the team’s performance, ranking and participation in key events regionally.

The GTTA will make an announcement on the squad in the coming days.
Director of Sport, Steve Ninvalle, said, “The NSC’s support stems from a request for support from the GTTA and the Commission voted to extend a hand relating to assisting with a grant of $1M.”

Ninvalle pointed out that the NSC will continue to assist the country’s sports associations and athletes in their quest for development.

“With the restart of competitions occurring globally in the sport and with world-ranking becoming a major factor in determining qualification for key events, given the COVID-19 pandemic, Godfrey Munroe, president of the GTTA, pointed out “it has become critical that our association is able to have our players participate in key competitions and training camps as a means of having our players continue to gain the requisite exposure and preparation in view of positioning them to gain world-ranking points.

“Munroe said that this will “maximise our chances of qualification and success at key international competitions and games while improving our trajectory at key and major international competitions.”

Further the Pan American championships will be used to select the teams for the World Table Tennis championships in Chengdu, China, in March of 2022, the teams for the Pan American Cup among other key competitions, in addition to obtaining world-ranking points being key in selecting participating teams for the 2022 Commonwealth Games,” Munroe highlighted.

The GTT president stressed that will change the tennis landscape, mostly because of COVID-19, “It has therefore become absolutely critical and imperative that Guyana attend these championships in order to have team gain the necessary ranking points, in order to stay ahead of key teams regionally, so as to be able to gain qualification spots for Commonwealth Games, World championships and maintain our trajectory.”