De­fend­ing cham­pi­on, Omatie Ma­habir of Wa­ter­loo Sec­ondary made a pos­i­tive start in her bid to re­peat as T&T women's draughts cham­pi­onship at the Lar­ry Gomes Stad­um, Mal­abar on Sun­day. With a full au­di­ence on hand, Ma­habir of Freeport had a tough bat­tle on her hands in achieve­ing her six points from three games. Coached by Pe­ter Ram­sun­dar she played well against promis­ing youth play­er Trea­sure Haynes. Haynes played a bal­anced game with sus­tained pres­sure up to the 30th move, but could not re­spond when Ma­habir opened the board and re­leased the pres­sure, win­ning two points in the process. For­mer Un­der-19 cham­pi­on Ani­ta Ram­sun­dar had to an­swer Haynes, who had a set po­si­tion and win­ning moves to check her counter moves and won by a clear mar­gin.

Sec­ond on the stand­ings is Cis­ley Fos­ter who al­so had a win­ning po­si­tion against Ram­sun­dar but failed to find the right move. Ram­sun­dar could not cap­i­talise on Fos­ter's mis­takes and the two set­tled for a draw. Third is Haynes, while Aleyah Ali who won two of her three games and was beat­en in the oth­er, is fourth. On Sun­day, the fi­nal two rounds will take place at the same venue from 11 am to de­ter­mine the na­tion­al women's cham­pi­on. The cham­pi­onship bat­tle will be fo­cosed on cur­rent cham­pi­on Ma­habir fac­ing Fos­ter on board one, and on board two, Aleyah Ali plays Haynes.