2-TIME CARIBBEAN JUNIOR CHAMP: Seth Thong
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2-TIME CARIBBEAN JUNIOR CHAMP: Seth Thong
THE first serve in the first professional squash tournament to ever take place in Trinidad and Tobago is scheduled to be hit just after 5 p.m. today.
There will be eight matches on the program as the entire first round of the QPCC (Queen’s Park Cricket Club) Professional Squash Association (PSA) Tournament will be contested at QPCC’s Indoor Racquet Centre, Queen’s Park Oval, St Clair.
The top eight seeds have received byes and will begin their campaign in the round of 16 tomorrow. All six players from the host country will be in action today and they will all be facing seeded players as half of the 32 players involved are seeds.
Colin Ramasra, arguably the most successful player ever produced in this country, and two-time Caribbean junior champion Seth Thong, the brightest young prospect in at least the last decade, will be involved in the first two matches.
It will be the first competitive match for Ramasra since he was listed at No. 1 in the spotlight age-group (35-39) in the European Squash Federation Masters when the sport was shut down for Covid-19 in March 2020. The ten-time national champ, who managed to get inside the top 150 in the world during a short professional career over a decade ago, will oppose Leo Vargas, a Mexican who is ranked #245 and seeded ninth.
The 15-year-old Thong will come up ten-time Barbados national champ Shawn Simpson, the only unranked of the 16 seeds. In the second turn an hour later, Brandon De Montrichard, runner-up National Championships in 2018, will face the only world-ranked player from the Caribbean in the field, Bermudan Taylor Carrick – ranked #666 and seeded 14th.
Briton Nick Sutcliffe, who is seeded right after and is ranked #712, will be opposing Joel Augustine at the same time. The other two T&T players are scheduled to take the court at 8 p.m. in the fourth and final turn.
Zachery Loquan will be up against Mexican Arturo Vidal, ranked #562 and seeded 13th, and Caribbean under-15 silver-medallist Nicholas Lequay faces tenth-seeded and 350th ranked Santiago Orazco of Colombia.
National over-40 champ Julian Chin, who has local roots but is representing his native Guyana, will tackle the 11th seeded world No. 364 Jan Wipperfurth of Germany an hour before.
And in the other first-round contest, also at 7 p.m., Guyana’s Jason Ray Khalil comes up against 12th seeded and 533rd ranked Filipe Tovar of Colombia. Compatriot Andreas Herrera is the highest of the 15 world ranked player in the field at #158 and he is followed by eight players between 200 and 300.
The list of foreigners contains three players each from Colombia and Mexico as well as two apiece from England and New Zealand and one each from Canada, France, Germany, and Netherlands.
Minister of Sport and Community Development Shamfa Cudjoe and QPCC president Dr Nigel Camacho will be the guests of honour during the opening ceremony at 3.30 p.m. The tournament will continue on a daily basis until Saturday.
COLIN RAMASRA had the dubious distinction of losing the first match in this country’s first-ever professional squash tournament yesterday at QPCC Indoor Racquet Centre, Queen’s Park Oval, St Clair.
Trinidad and Tobago Cricket Board (TTCB) president Azim Bassarath is not in support of having separate coaches for West Indies white-ball and red-ball cricket teams, stating that Cricket West Indies (CWI) can’t support it at this point in time.
Speaking to Andre Baptiste on WESN TV’s Face of Sports programme last week, Bassarath, who is also a CWI director, said that the CWI’s limited finances have meant that the regional first-class competition will be limited to one round again next year and is doubtful the situation will improve sufficiently enough for them to be able to have separate coaches.
The Trinidad and Tobago Red Force banked on their experienced spinners to dominate the Combined Campuses and Colleges in their CG United Super50 Cup opener on Monday night.
However, head coach David Furlonge said they may have to adjust their strategy against a much more experienced and versatile Guyana Harpy Eagles line up.
The Red Force will face the Harpy Eagles at the Brian Lara Cricket Academy in Tarouba from 2 p.m. today and while it is only the second game of the tournament for both sides, a lot is on the line. The Guyana outfit lost their opening match on Monday against the Windward Islands Volcanoes at the Queen’s Park Oval, so they will be eager to make amends.
Barbados Pride defeated West Indies Academy by six wickets in their Zone B match of the Super50 Cup at Coolidge Cricket Ground, in Antigua, yesterday.
The West Indies Academy batting first, were all out in 46 overs, compiling 213 with Keagan Simmons top-scoring on 64, while Kevin Wickham (52) also recorded a half-century and Teddy Bishop chipped in with 45. For the Pride, Roshon Primus and Roston Chase each picked up three wickets apiece.
After four seasons with the Halifax Wanderers, Trinidad and Tobago’s Akeem Garcia departs as the all-time leading scorer in club history and is second all-time in appearances.
Garcia is out of contract and appears to be part of the house clearing after Stephen Hart, another Trinidadian, was removed as head-coach after five years in charge of the Canadian Premier League club.
THE world junior champion will be in action tonight when this country’s first-ever professional squash tournament continues at QPCC (Queen’s Park Cricket Club) Indoor Racquet Centre, Queen’s Park Oval, St Clair.
Rowan Damming and the seven other leading seeded players will begin their campaign after being on byes in the QPCC (Queen’s Park Cricket Club) Professional Squash Association (PSA) Tournament.
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