Nigel Si­mon

This coun­try's se­nior women's and men's vol­ley­ball squad will have a busy month of Ju­ly as they are set to com­pete at both the Pan Amer­i­can Cup and de­fend their Caribbean Vol­ley­ball Cham­pi­onship crowns. First up, the Gideon Dick­son-coached men's squad, com­ing off a sev­enth place fin­ish at the Norce­ca Con­ti­nen­tal Olympic Qual­i­fi­ca­tion Tour­na­ment held last month in Los An­ge­les, will com­pete at the Sev­enth Pan Amer­i­can Cup in San­to Domin­go, Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic from Ju­ly 7 to 15. T&T, which has fin­ished in the sixth spot in its three pre­vi­ous ap­pear­ances (2006-2008) and is cur­rent­ly ranked 33rd in the world, will com­pete in the eight-team tour­na­ment against de­fend­ing cham­pi­on and world top-ranked team Brazil, USA (#6), Ar­genti­na (#8), Venezuela (#16), Cana­da (#18), Pana­ma (#42) and Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic (#43). USA is the most suc­cess­ful team in the tour­na­ment hav­ing won four times (2006, 2008, 2009, 2010), while Mex­i­co was the oth­er win­ner in 2007.

On com­ple­tion of the one-week com­pe­ti­tion, the na­tion­al men's team will jour­ney straight to St Croix, US Vir­gin Is­lands where it will de­fend its re­gion­al crown, won last year for the first time in Suri­name. Mean­while, the na­tion­al women's squad coached by Cuban-born Fran­cis­co "Panche" Cruz head to Ciu­dad Juarez, Mex­i­co for the 12-team XI Women's Pan Amer­i­can Cup. In Mex­i­co, 34th world rat­ed T&T, the three-team reign­ing Caribbean cham­pi­on and four-time win­ners will do bat­tle with ti­tle-hold­er and world sec­ond-ranked Brazil, Pe­ru (#17), Ar­genti­na (#18) and 26th-ranked Colom­bia from South Amer­i­ca. The oth­er Norce­ca teams in­volved are world top ranked USA, Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic (#9), Cu­ba (#10), Puer­to Ri­co (#19), Cana­da (#22), Mex­i­co (#27) and Cos­ta Ri­ca (#28).

Apart from its win last year, Brazil al­so cap­tured the Pan Amer­i­can Cup in 2006 and 2009 while Cu­ba, ranked third in Norce­ca be­hind USA and Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic, has won four ti­tles, 2002, 2004, 2005 and 2007. Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic which will com­pete in next month's Lon­don Olympic Games are two-time win­ners' (2008, 2010) while USA has won once. This year will mark the sixth straight ap­pear­ance at the Pan Amer­i­can Cup for the lo­cal women's team which has fin­ished tenth three times (2009-2011) and 12th, both in 2007 and 2008. Like the lo­cal men's team, the Krys­tle Es­delle-cap­tain women's squad will have lit­tle time to rest as they will next com­pete in St Croix at the Caribbean tour­ney from Ju­ly 22 to 30. In prepa­ra­tion for the tour­na­ments, all the na­tion­al play­ers were able to get in some valu­able match prac­tice when they lined up for their re­spec­tive clubs in the just con­clud­ed Caribbean In­vi­ta­tion­al Vol­ley­ball League at the Jean Pierre Com­plex, Mu­cu­rapo.