Sh­er­nice Thomas

Na­tion­al cham­pi­ons Char­lotte Knag­gs, Nku Patrick and Faith Gillezeau kept T&T's hopes alive as the three re­main­ing play­ers in the main draw at the end of day one of the Caribbean Area Squash As­so­ci­a­tion's Ju­nior Cham­pi­onships in Kingston, Ja­maica, on Fri­day. The na­tion­al team's en­durance skills were stretched out thin as the first match was served off at 9 am and the last be­ing played af­ter 11 pm. Boys' un­der-17 na­tion­al cham­pi­on, Patrick, made it in­to yes­ter­day's quar­ter­fi­nals af­ter dis­miss­ing Ba­jan, Bran­don Strak­er, in an em­bar­rass­ing fash­ion. The Ba­jan could not get more than two points against Patrick who tri­umphed 11-2 in three straight sets. The quar­ter­fi­nal served off af­ter mid­night yes­ter­day.

Hope­ful­ly Patrick did not fol­low in his broth­er's foot­steps who went un­der to home boy, Ashante Smith, in the boys' un­der-19 quar­ter­fi­nal. The old­er Patrick sib­ling, Man­dela, seemed well on his way to vic­to­ry af­ter beat­ing Ja­maican, Josh Mah­food, 11-8 11-4 11-9 in round one. How­ev­er, the quar­ter­fi­nal was cer­tain­ly no "walk in the park" for Smith who was made to work for semi­fi­nal spot as each game was won by no more than two points.

Smith even­tu­al­ly got the up­per hand on the hard-fight­ing na­tion­al champ 12-10 12-10 11-9. Gillezeau made it straight in­to the girls' un­der-15 semi­fi­nals yes­ter­day af­ter re­ceiv­ing a bye in the quar­ter­fi­nals. There the girls' na­tion­al un­der-15 champ faced Bermu­da's Tiye Williams. Gillezeau clinched the first two games 11-6, 11-8, on­ly to have her op­po­nent bounce back 10-12 in the third. How­ev­er in the end, Gillezeau sealed her semi­fi­nal spot with an 11-6 win in the fourth game. She was set to face top seed, Laris­sa Wilt­shire of Guyana, at 6.40pm last evening. Reign­ing se­nior women's na­tion­al champ and de­fend­ing girls' un­der-17 Caribbean cham­pi­on, Char­lotte Knag­gs, made it to the girls' un­der-17 quar­ter­fi­nal on a bye which al­so played yes­ter­day. Num­ber one seed Knag­gs bat­tled Bermu­da's Em­ma Keane. Knag­gs should have had no prob­lem tri­umph­ing over her op­po­nent who had much dif­fi­cul­ty in beat­ing Ba­jan, Gyl­la Macken­zie, in their round one match. Keane lost the first two games 6-11, 8-11, be­fore sal­vaging a 11-8 11-2 12-10 come­back in the fol­low­ing three match­es.