T&T's se­nior men's rug­by team made a con­vinc­ing start to its North Amer­i­ca and Caribbean Rug­by As­so­ci­a­tion (Nacra) South Cham­pi­onship, on Sat­ur­day, eas­ing past host team Bar­ba­dos, 44-7.

At the Gar­ri­son Sa­van­nah, T&T se­cured the win by a mar­gin wide enough for the Ca­lyp­so War­riors to earn a bonus point and to leapfrog Guyana in the one-round three-team stand­ings on points-dif­fer­ence. Guyana opened the cham­pi­onship on March 7 with a com­fort­able 48-22 home win over Bar­ba­dos.

The War­riors' win on Sat­ur­day put them in the fa­mil­iar sit­u­a­tion of play­ing Guyana, its bit­ter ri­val, to de­ter­mine the team that ad­vances to the win­ner of the North Zone Cham­pi­onship. That match will take place in Port-of-Spain on April 11.

T&T got off to a fly­ing start with ear­ly tries from winger An­der­son Joseph and prop Ernest Wright. Clos­er to the end of the half, Akiel Smith scored an­oth­er T&T try, which was con­vert­ed by Fe­li­cian Guer­ra.

Bar­ba­dos then re­turned fire through teenaged scrum-half Mikyle Wal­cott, who scored a con­vert­ed try, com­plet­ed by Kevin Carter, to close the half at 19-7, in T&T's favour.

The sec­ond pe­ri­od was re­turned with an even more dom­i­nant and phys­i­cal per­for­mance from the away team. Joseph dou­bled up with an­oth­er try, while Joseph Quashie and flanker Jesse Richards added a sin­gle and pair of tries, re­spec­tive­ly. The match then blew off soon af­ter Shakir Flem­ming scored the fi­nal try for T&T.

Ei­ther T&T or Guyana will play ei­ther Mex­i­co or Cay­man Is­lands in the fi­nal.

Mex­i­co and Cay­man Is­lands are both on three points af­ter one match with both hav­ing won their open­ers against USA South, 50-25 and 25-24, re­spec­tive­ly. They will al­so meet to de­ter­mine the North Zone Cham­pi­onship win­ner on April 11, the same day the South Zone Cham­pi­onship win­ner will de de­cid­ed.

Stand­ings

Teams Pld W D L F A B Pts

T&T 1 1 0 0 44 7 1 3

Guyana 1 1 0 0 48 22 1 3

Bar­ba­dos 2 0 0 2 29 92 0 0