JavaScript is disabled in your web browser or browser is too old to support JavaScript. Today almost all web pages contain JavaScript, a scripting programming language that runs on visitor's web browser. It makes web pages functional for specific purposes and if disabled for some reason, the content or the functionality of the web page can be limited or unavailable.

Friday, July 18, 2025

Calypso Girls put in final prep

by

Rachael Thompson-King
2199 days ago
20190711
T&T netball captain Rhonda John-Davis.

T&T netball captain Rhonda John-Davis.

T&T cap­tain Rhon­da John-Davis knows all too well that she and her fel­low "Ca­lyp­so Girls" face an up­hill task when they open against South Africa to­mor­row in the Net­ball World Cup in Liv­er­pool, Eng­land.

Fol­low­ing an in­tense week­end of warmup match­es dur­ing the Wales Sum­mer Test Se­ries in Cardiff, the play­ers have been us­ing this week to cor­rect and im­prove on their game, specif­i­cal­ly on de­fence.

The 10th-ranked T&T played three prac­tice match­es against two teams ranked high­er than them on the In­ter­na­tion­al Net­ball Fed­er­a­tion (INF) world rank­ings, in­clud­ing North­ern Ire­land (8th) and Malawi (9th) and al­so tan­gled with hosts Wales (12th).

"Our ex­pe­ri­ence in Wales thought us to be more team-ori­ent­ed on de­fence in­stead of the one-on-one (de­fence). This will help us in slow­ing the op­po­nent's ball," John-Davis told Guardian Me­dia yes­ter­day.

"We def­i­nite­ly learned what to ex­pect in terms of the phys­i­cal­i­ty. We have to find a way to ad­just. They're re­strict­ing our move­ments so we have to find a way to re­strict them.

"On at­tack, we've learned is to be more sup­port­ive of each oth­er be­cause of the type of phys­i­cal­i­ty that is be­ing played from the UK teams. We learned that that ex­tra sup­port is need­ed in or­der to en­sure that our ball gets to the cir­cle."

In the warmups, T&T first drew 49-49 with North­ern Ire­land, then went un­der to the Welsh 72-64 be­fore falling to Malawi 53-52 at the Sport Wales Na­tion­al Cen­tre.

Com­ment­ing on the ex­pe­ri­ence gained from these match­es, John-Davis said, "My team­mates and I re­al­ly ap­pre­ci­at­ed the op­por­tu­ni­ty. This ex­pe­ri­ence was need­ed go­ing in­to the World Cup. These games gave us the op­por­tu­ni­ty to im­prove our rank­ings al­so to as­sess the teams and um­pires from oth­er re­gions, es­pe­cial­ly the UK re­gion."

John-Davis, who will be mak­ing his­to­ry by com­pet­ing in her sixth World Cup, said she will be aim­ing to lead the Wes­ley "Pepe" Gomes team to vic­to­ry against a tough South African unit, who in two of their warmup match­es ver­sus Wales won in dom­i­nat­ing fash­ion 84-32 and 79-44 re­spec­tive­ly.

She said, "Part of my job as a cap­tain is to con­stant­ly re­mind my team­mates about the im­por­tance of team sup­port on at­tack and de­fence, as we saw it is need­ed to be able to coun­ter­act the South Africans' style of play."

It will get not get any eas­i­er for the "Ca­lyp­so Girls" as the World Cup pro­gress­es ei­ther, as they will next face Ja­maica in their sec­ond pre­lim­i­nary round match in Group C on Sat­ur­day. The "Sun­shine Girls" are ranked sec­ond in the world. In the fi­nal first-round match on Sun­day, T&T plays 17th-ranked Fi­ji.


Related articles

Sponsored

Weather

PORT OF SPAIN WEATHER

Sponsored