Sh­er­nice Thomas

Solan­gel Guz­man, the 2006 CAC women's sin­gles cham­pi­on, will lead the charge of T&T's four-mem­ber squad for the XVII Pe­ru In­ter­na­tion­al Bad­minton Cham­pi­onships in Li­ma. Guz­man will be joined by five-time na­tion­al women's sin­gles cham­pi­on, Nekeisha Blake, Ka­masha Robert­son and Keeron Gar­cia. They will de­part T&T on April 8 to par­tic­i­pate in the in­ter­na­tion­al tour­ney which serves off from April 11-15. The squad has high hopes of per­form­ing well and is cur­rent­ly train­ing five days a week. Guz­man is a for­mer Cuban cham­pi­on, who will be rep­re­sent­ing T&T for the first time in an in­ter­na­tion­al tour­na­ment. When con­tact­ed by the T&T Guardian, the Cuban had this to say about her de­ci­sion in don­ning the red, black and white for the first time: "It's just re­al­ly the ex­cite­ment. I'm very ex­cit­ed to rep­re­sent T&T at this tour­na­ment and do my best."

Guz­man is no stranger to the Pe­ru tour­ney, hav­ing en­tered on two pre­vi­ous oc­ca­sions. Her first time was in 2006 where she placed third, and she en­tered again in 2009 smash­ing her way to sil­ver in the women's sin­gles and dou­bles. This year Guz­man has her eyes on the gold in the women's sin­gles and dou­bles where she will team up with Robert­son. How­ev­er, she ad­mit­ted that this tour­ney will be tough for her, as this would be her first in­ter­na­tion­al tour­na­ment since 2009: "I'm very hap­py that I can par­tic­i­pate this year. But I know it's go­ing to be a hard tour­na­ment be­cause this is an Olympic year, so every­one would be try­ing to do their best to get Olympic points. But I'm just hap­py to be play­ing. I have a lot of sup­port, I have a lot of good peo­ple coach­ing me and a good team to work with. I al­so have to say thanks to my spon­sor So­lo." Guz­man in­tends to rep­re­sent T&T in up­com­ing in­ter­na­tion­al tour­na­ments such as the US Open and Pan Amer­i­can Games lat­er this year.

The play­ers are be­ing as­sist­ed by for­mer na­tion­al coach, Trevor Smith, tech­ni­cal di­rec­tor of the T&T Bad­minton As­so­ci­a­tion (T&TBA), Dr Tony Grice, and for­mer na­tion­al men's sin­gles cham­pi­on, Anil Seep­aul. Smith, who has pro­duced tal­ents such as four-time Sports­woman of the Year, Dr De­bra O'Con­nor, be­lieves that Guz­man has the po­ten­tial to reach very far in the tour­na­ment. Al­so tak­ing a shot in the women's sin­gles is Blake, who will be play­ing her first in­ter­na­tion­al tour­na­ment since 2010, when she en­tered the CAC games and made it to the quar­ter­fi­nals. Blake told the T&T Guardian that her main fo­cus head­ing in­to the tour­ney is to de­vel­op her skills and eval­u­ate her­self as a play­er: "I am us­ing this tour­na­ment more as an as­sess­ment and as an op­por­tu­ni­ty to see where I am at as a play­er. I'm us­ing this as a learn­ing ex­pe­ri­ence and my main fo­cus is de­vel­op­ment (of skills)." The reign­ing lo­cal cham­pi­on in­tends to put her "best arm for­ward" how­ev­er, and is head­ing in with an at­ti­tude of op­ti­mism, "I am go­ing in with an at­ti­tude to win and am very op­ti­mistic. I'm putting 100 per cent in­to it." lake will al­so team up with Gar­cia in the mixed dou­bles.