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.