Co-captains, Joelisa Cooper and Candice Guerrero will lead a 12-member T&T senior women's netball team which depart for England via Caribbean Airlines at 7.40pm along with a four-member technical staff headed by coach Wesley "Pepe" Gomes for a Three-Test series against England and the Netball EuropeRanking Competition and Open Championship.
In addition to Cooper and Guerrero, other regular members of the team selected for the tour which will serve as preparations for the upcoming 14th Netball World Cup in Sydney Australia, from August 7-16 are Samantha Wallace, Kemba Duncan, Rhonda John-Davis, Onella Jack, Kalifa Mc Collin, Afeisha Noel, Daystar Swift, and Kielle Connelly, the "Most Valuable Player" of the recently concluded Courts All Sectors Netball League.
The series against world third ranked England will see T&T play matches on Wednesday May 6 at the Sports Training Village in Bath; May 8 at the Copper Box Arena, London and three days later at Echo Arena, Liverpool. The "Calypso netballers" will then go to Belfast, to compete at the Netball Europe Open Championship from May 14–17 in Northern Ireland against the host, Scotland, Wales, England and fellow guest team South Africa. The quartet of Gibraltar (#34), Ireland (#28), Malta (#36) and Switzerland (#30) will compete in a rankings round-robin tournament.
Commenting on the team's preparations ahead of the tour, coach Gomes said he was satisfied to a certain point with how things have gone. He added, Considering the resources we had to work with I would say we have done the best we can even though as a coach you always want more," added Gomes. Looking ahead to the tri-series with England, Gomes first pointed out that last year the T&T women were beaten by their opponents mainly due to weak centre court play." "We have been doing a lot in this area and also on our transition from attack to defence. "I know we have made some strides, but we need to test ourselves at the international level and with England having a new coach and this being their last international matches in front of their own crowd before the World Cup, it should be a good challenge for us", ended Gomes.
The "Calypso Netballers" who won the world title in 1979 jointly with the Australia and New Zealand will come up against the top two teams in the world, host Australia and New Zealand in Pool A as well as Caribbean rivals Barbados in round-robin play in Australia. T&T qualified for the World Cup in 2014 after winning the AFNA (Americas Federation of Netball Associations) Championship tournament in Calgary, Canada. Pool B of the 2015 Championship features world third and fourth ranked teams, England and Jamaica as well as Scotland and Samoa, while Malawi, South Africa, Singapore and Sri Lanka comprise Pool C, and the quartet of Fiji, Wales, Uganda and Zambia make up Pool D with the matches carded for the 21,000 seat Allphones Arena (formerly known as the Sydney SuperDome and Acer Arena), Sydney Olympic Park.
�2T&T netball team for England tour: Samantha Wallace, Kemba Duncan, Joelisa Cooper, Candice Guerrero, Rhonda John-Davis, Jellene Richardson, Onella Jack, Kalifa Mc Collin, Amanda Cameron Afeisha Noel, Daystar Swift, Kielle Connelly.
Technical staff: Wesely "Pepe" Gomes (coach), Grace Patkinson-Griffith (assistant coach), Keva Stephens (fitness coach), Carol Gittens (manager).