2021 US Jnr Open Squash C/Ships

Dec 23, 2021 Sports

Guyanese played great Squash, more International exposure needed for players

By Sean Devers

KAIETEUR News – Team Guyana was represented by Shomari Wilshire, Samuel Ince-Carvalhal, Mohryan Baksh, Michael Alphonso and Nicholas Verwey at the 2021 US Junior Open Squash Championships which concluded for the Guyanese Tuesday.

Team Guyana showed fight in their overseas outing.

Verwey won his first match and lost his second to finish at the quarter finals of the U-17 consolation phase of the tournament, while Ince-Carvalhal won both his matches but lost in the semi-finals of the U-19 plate catorgety. Wilshire lost in the Plate final Tuesday.
Loraine Carvalhal, Samuel’s mom, is member of the Guyana Squash Association (GSA) and accompanied the team to the USA.
“The boys performed well, Verway and Wilshire in particular, in the matches they actually lost…their performances were outstanding… they were up there with the best of them and on Monday, Verway’s performance, although he lost, he really fought hard.
Garfield and Shomari will be flying home today, Sammy, Nicholas and Mohryan will be coming home with me on Thursday and Mickey is staying in the US for Christmas,” informed Ms. Carvalhal.
“The gap between the Caribbean and the International level is wide between the top players but our boys rallied with the best of them. They played quite well and Shomari got quite far in the main draw and got knocked by a high seed.
Nicholas got knocked out by the boy who is now in the final of the Consolation round,” continued Carvalhal.
“It’s a big difference in the temperatures which has affected them quite a bit with the cold and the muscles and the movement on Court.
But yeah, we have had a good run we just need some more of this exposure. We need to get them to as many of these tournaments as we can to compete with people who are going all over the world throughout the year.
The ones at the top have been everywhere, they have played in all the Opens in the world…they have played all over the place,” explained Carvalhal.
“We were hoping to host our Nationals at the end of this year…between Christmas and the New Year but that’s not for sure as yet.
But next year…the Sports Academy has just opened at the Racket Centre last week, so January we are hoping to get them training and then we will be looking to see maybe if they will go to the Junior World Boys if they can. I think it’s in Russia.
But we want to get them to as much International tournaments as possible if we can get the support,” Carvalhal posited.