Wesley "Pepe" Gomes, coach of the World Cup-bound T&T "Calypso netballers", says the time is right for the relevant authorities and the Netball Association (T&TNA) to look into the formation of a semi-professional or professional netball league.
A former national basketballer and coach of Defence Force netball and basketball teams, Gomes was speaking at a farewell function hosted by Australian High Commissioner, His Excellency, Ross Tysoe AO and Ms Helen Saunderson at his official residence, Perseverance Road, Moka, Maraval, on Wednesday, for the netball team which leaves tomorrow for Australia to contest the 14th Netball World Cup.
The two-week tournament will take place at the Allphones Arena, (formerly known as the Sydney Super Dome and Acer Arena), Olympic Park, Sydney.The Calypso netballers will come up against the two top-ranked teams in the world–Australia, who are the defending Commonwealth and world champions New Zealand.
They will also play newly-installed Caribbean second-ranked team Barbados in Pool A.T&T, world champions back in 1979, along with Australia and New Zealand on home soil, qualified for the World Cup as winners of the Americas Federation of Netball Association (AFNA) Championship held in Alberta, Canada, last August, ahead of Barbados, while the other ten teams qualified via their regional qualifying competitions.
Pool B of the 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 Fiji, Wales, Uganda and Zambia are in Pool D.Since lifting the world title, T&T's best ever finish was third in 1983 in Singapore, while at the last two editions, T&T ended 11th.
T&T coach Gomes said a key part to getting back to being among the top teams in the world is the organisation of a professional league or a semi-professional.Gomes said he felt it was time the Netball Association or some local organisation looked seriously into the formation of a proper national league.
He added: "We do need some form of a proper league and for me it does not matter who runs it, once it's has the full backing of the T&TNA, which should play a leading role."He added, "I know a couple years back Sports Event Co-ordinator Selwyn Melville had discussions with the Ministry of Sport and Ministry of National Security, about the possibilities of running a national team, but I don't know how far those discussions reached and whether those plants were still being looked at."
"I was privy to some of those meetings, but I don't know what became of it in the end, and hopefully it's something that could be looked at again seriously," added Gomes.A former Coast Guard officer, Gomes said on a national level he along with previous coaches have been asking for a professional or semi-professional league for some time.
"We need to have the girls involve all year round and if we can't have a professional or semi-professional league here, we need to get them out to England or Australia, or even something like the West Indies set-up, where we have them on retainer contracts will help."
"The retainer contracts will make them commit much more to being fit, practice a lot more, and become disciplined because as we say there is life after sport, and in this case netball."There is nothing to motivate the players other than the competition which they will get up for, but it must not just be about every four years, it must be ongoing and continuous every year".
With regards to his current squad, Gomes said the key to his team having success will be their ability to be athletic, and movement with and without the ball."We are now coming off a one-week camp in Mayaro where we continued to work on our combinations which we started when we went on the tour to England and the European Championships.
"We had the group of shooters together and defenders together working well and that's the way we build team chemistry."
"It's not just about your best seven, because it doesn't always work that way, so we have gotten the entire group involved and things have been great."
With regards to the improvement of the team's centre court play, which Gomes hinted at not being all too happy with during the European tour, he said, "As a coach you are never satisfied, but we have done our a lot of work on that position, giving them a lot of routes to run, so its now for us to see how well they have progress when we get to Australia and play the warm-up matches before the jump off of the actual tournament."
Asked if he was a concerned by the lack of international matches or exposure as compared to the other teams going into the tournament, Gomes replied, "The lack of international matches will always hamper a team.He added, "The more matches you play at that level will always help to build players confidence and allows you to see how players react to certain situations while giving you as a coach the chance to scout teams and see different styles as well, but there is nothing we could have done about it."
"The girls are in a very good buoyant mood and actually today (Wednesday) I had to stop practice and ask where was this hiding all the time, in terms of the energy and vibe of the players."With T&T not expected to be a major threat for the title, Gomes says he does not think his team is under any pressure to perform.
"No I don't think they will be under any sort of pressure because anyone who knows the sport and watches the rankings will see that we are in the toughest group in the tournament with top ranked country, host and world champions Australia, second ranked New Zealand and our Caribbean neighbours Barbados, which has risen above us in the rankings to ninth."
"But in saying that, anything can happen on the day, it's a round ball and the stars could line up and we could turn the place upside down in Australia and its j'ouvert."
"We are just going to go out and play to the best of our ability and I believe once we can do that in each match, people will appreciate the commitment and effort."Looking past the tournament, Gomes said he hopes that the national team will be kept together and given exposure, that's the only way we will progress.
"At the moment, there is a big gap between the local players and this group of 12 on the national team."If you put these girls back into club teams you will see the difference in level of play, so we are really hoping to have this team continue training and get the pool of players bigger, because it currently a small one."
"We have about 15 players and we need to double that pool to 30. I believe players should always be striving to get better and having more players to push for selection can only improve you."
"There is also a big gap between the senior national players and the rest of the country and this need to be rectified.
T&T team
Samantha Wallace, Kemba Duncan, Joelisa Cooper, Candice Guerrero, Rhonda John-Davis, Tricia Liverpool, 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).
Preliminary round groups
Pool A: No 1 Australia, No 2 New Zealand, No 9 Barbados, No10 T&T
Pool B: No 3 England, No 4 Jamaica, No 12 Scotland, No 14 Samoa
Pool C: No 5 Malawi, No 6 South Africa, No 19 Singapore, No 24 Sri Lanka
Pool D: No 7 Fiji, No 8 Wales, No 13 Uganda, No 18 Zambia
Qualification rounds
First Eight
Pool E: A-1, B-2, C-1, D-2
Pool F: A-2, B-1, C-2, D-1
NB: Top two teams from each pool qualify to the semifinals while the bottom two qualify to the fifth to eight playoffs.
Second Eight:
Pool G: A-3, B-4, C-3, D-4
Pool H: A-4, B-3, C-4, D-3
NB:
At the end of the second eight matches, the teams will then face off in the playoff matches for positions ninth to 16th.
Winner's row
Year*Host*Placing
1963*England*4th
1967*Australia*5th
1971*Jamaica*4th
1975*New Zealand*4th
1979*T&T*Joint 1st with T&T/Aus/NZ
1983*Singapore*3rd
1987*Scotland*Joint 2nd
1991*Australia*DNP
1995*England* 6th
1999*New Zealand*8th
2003*Jamaica*10th
2007*New Zealand*11th
2011*Singapore*11th