An­drew Gioan­net­ti

Trinidad North­ern stand­out Ryan Fred­er­ick will skip­per T&T's 24-per­son 15s rug­by team, which is set to chal­lenge for the North Amer­i­ca Caribbean Rug­by As­so­ci­a­tion (NACRA) Men's Rug­by Cham­pi­onship against fa­mil­iar op­po­si­tion in Bar­ba­dos and Guyana in the South Zone round-robin on Sat­ur­day and June 1, re­spec­tive­ly.

T&T will take on Bar­ba­dos at the Gar­ri­son Sa­van­nah next Sat­ur­day from 4 pm, be­fore re­turn­ing the fol­low­ing day to be­gin prepa­ra­tion for its all-im­por­tant clash with arch ri­val Guyana.

Fred­er­ick takes over from club­mate Jonathan O'Con­nor, who served in T&T's big win against Bar­ba­dos and heavy loss against Guyana just over a year ago and which saw the Ca­lyp­so War­riors out of con­tention for the IRB 2015 World Cup.

The T&T team, how­ev­er, will be seek­ing to make amends by tak­ing two pos­i­tive re­sults, even with the in­clu­sion of five se­nior 15s debu­tants. To­ba­go RFC's Melville East­man and Kwain Man­swell were se­lect­ed, along with Roy­alians duo Trizene McLean and Kereem Fi­garo and Caribs' An­tho­ny Lopez and Shaquille Tull. Chair­man of se­lec­tors and the team's man­ag­er Cur­tis Nero will make the trip along with head coach Lar­ry Mendez, as­sis­tant coach Dale Trot­man and phys­io­ther­a­pist Derek Ash­by-Williams.

The last time T&T met Bar­ba­dos was at St Mary's Col­lege Ground, Ser­pen­tine Road, last May, and the host took away a con­vinc­ing 32-3 win. How­ev­er, on­ly days lat­er, T&T took the trip to Guyana and was stunned 20-0.T&T, Bar­ba­dos and Guyana will vie for the top spot in the group and the win­ner will meet the round-robin win­ner of the three-team North group, which in­cludes a USA South team, the Cay­man Is­lands and Bermu­da. USA South cur­rent­ly leads the group with one match played and won. It nar­row­ly de­feat­ed the Cay­man Is­lands 9-7.

Team: Melville East­man (To­ba­go RFC), Ernest Wright (Caribs), John Hill (Har­vard Club), Row­ell Gor­don (Har­vard), Fe­li­cian Guer­ra (Roy­alians), Miguel Lara (Caribs), Ja­mal Clark (Caribs), Keis­hon Walk­er (To­ba­go RFC), An­tho­ny Lopez (Caribs RFC), Shaquille Tull (Caribs), Trizene Mc Lean (Roy­alians), Greame Alkins (Caribs), Wayne Kel­ly (Har­vard), Graeme Alkins (Caribs), Wayne Kel­ly (Har­vard), Adam Fred­er­ick (North­ern, cap­tain), Jonathan O'Con­nor (North­ern), Tariq Cheekes (Har­vard), Jesse Richards (UWI), Kel­son Fi­garo (Roy­alians), Kereem Fi­garo (Roy­alians), Joseph Quashie (Har­vard), James Phillip (Roy­alians), Kwain Man­swell (To­ba­go RFC).

Staff: Lar­ry Mendez (coach), Dale Trot­man (as­sis­tant coach), Derek Ash­by-Williams (phys­io­ther­a­pist), Cur­tis Nero (man­ag­er).