Defending champion team Naparima College will be going all out to defend its title and achieve a hat-trick of wins at the 14th Annual First Citizens National Secondary Schools Chess Championship which will take place on Sunday at Aranguez North Secondary School.
Naparima will start as firm favourites since it is expected to field a very strongest team which is expected to be led once again by star player, FIDE Master (FM) Alan Safar Ramoutar, and includes Candidate Master (CM) Rayden Rampersad, as well as national Under-14 champion Keagan Ragoobar.
Ramoutar, 16, is fresh from placing second in the senior national chess championship which concluded last month and has booked a place on the T&T team for the World Chess Olympiad scheduled to take place in Russia next August.
He is also the national Under-16 champion and is expected to be the chess nominee for the First Citizen Sports Foundation Male Junior Award.
However, Naparima will have to overcome tough challenges from former champion, Presentation College, Chaguanas, with Kiran Mohammed and Zidane Boodoo: Hillview College- with National Under-12 Champion Juninho La Fleur, Sameer Ali and which is coached by FIDE Instructor Dev Soondarsingh: St Mary’s College with (CM) Sean Yearwood and Peter Chin, while another former champion, Fatima College, has Aaron Chaitram and Kyle Valle in their team.
Not to be underestimated, the girl schools are again in the running with last year’s second-place school, St. Joseph Convent PoS, being led this year by former national Under-12 champion Marliyah Mason-Phillips, St Augustine Girls High School with female National Under-14 Champion Zara La Fleur who placed third in the recent senior women’s national championship and will be travelling to Russia with the national Olympiad team.
Also expected to be n action contention is St Francois Girls College, led by new Women’s National Champion (WCM) Shemilah James, who is expected to be the chess nominee for the First Citizens Sports Foundation in both female senior and junior categories.
Also looking to be among the prizes are Brad Munroe-Brown, Kalel Scoon, Kevin Maharaj, Justin Ramtahal, Keshav York-Ventour, Ross Murray, Joshua Martin, Keira Samual-Bisnath and Kayla Martin.