T&T men and women’s teams failed in their bid to se­cure this coun­try’s first medal on Fri­day’s penul­ti­mate day of com­pe­ti­tion at the 63rd Caribbean Re­gion­al Ta­ble Ten­nis Fed­er­a­tion Se­nior Cham­pi­onship at the Na­tion­al Gym­na­si­um in George­town, Guyana.

This af­ter the men’s team of Der­ron Dou­glas, Yu­vraaj Dookram and Aaron Wil­son were beat­en 3-1 in their quar­ter­fi­nal en­counter with Bar­ba­dos to fall short of a medal guar­an­tee while the women’s team of teenagers, Chloe Fras­er, Priyan­ka Khellawan, and Imani Ed­wards-Tay­lor did not ad­vance from their round-robin three-team pool.

On Thurs­day in their Group Three open­er, T&T men went un­der to the Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic 3-0 with Wil­son and Dou­glas los­ing the dou­bles clash to Glenn Car­ras­co and Isaac Vi­la, 4-11, 7-11, 11-8, 11-7, 7-11, be­fore Dookram fell to Samuel Galvez 11-6, 5-11, 11-7, 7-11, 7-11, and Dou­glas was over­pow­ered by Vi­la, 12-10, 3-11, 8-11, 6-11.

How­ev­er, in their fi­nal pool match, a vir­tu­al sec­ond-placed de­cider, T&T de­feat­ed St Lu­cia 3-1 with Dou­glas and Wil­son beat­ing Dawitt Nurse and Raw­son Har­ris 11-5, 11-8, 11-6; Wil­son beat­ing Har­ris 11-9, 11-7, 11-9, and Dookram out­play­ing Nurse 11-5, 11-7, 8-11, 11-7 af­ter he was beat­en by De An­dre Calderon 12-10, 11-9, 9-11, 11-8 in his first match.

With a semi­fi­nal spot and bronze medal at stake on Fri­day af­ter­noon, Bar­ba­dos put an end to the T&T men’s medal hopes de­spite Dou­glas and Wil­son win­ning the open­er, 11-13, 11-17, 11-8, 11-2.

This, as Dookram was then out­played by Tyrese Knight 11-9, 2-11, 7-11, 11-13; Wil­son was up­staged by Mark Dow­ell 6-11, 9-11, 11-2, 10-12, and Dou­glas came up short against Knight, 5-11, 10-12, 6-11.

In the women’s Team com­pe­ti­tion, T&T was swept aside 3-0 by both Cu­ba and the Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic on Thurs­day, and Fri­day, re­spec­tive­ly.

First, Cu­ba’s Idalys Lovet and Liz­dainet Ro­driguez beat 17-year-old Ed­wards-Tay­lor, and 14-year-old Khellawan 11-3, 11-2, 11-8 fol­lowed by Es­tela Cre­spo 11-5, 10-12, 11-6, 11-9 win over 14-year-old Fras­er, and Ro­driguez beat­ing Khellawan 11-6, 11-6, 11-3.

In the clash with the Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic, the lo­cal trio al­so suf­fered a scold­ing with Es­mer­lyn Cas­tro and Yasiris beat­ing Ed­wards-Tay­lor, and Khellawan 11-6, 11-6, 11-2; Eva Brit­to, an 11-3, 11-6, 11-6 win­ner over Fras­er and Or­tiz 11-3, 11-1, 11-6 against Khellawan.

Pri­or to the Team events, the lo­cal quar­tet of Wil­son, Dou­glas, Khellawan and Fras­er were all beat­en in their re­spec­tive men’s and women’s sin­gles round-of-16 match­es while Ed­wards-Tay­lor and 33-year-old Yu­vraaj Dookram did not ad­vance from their round-robin pools.

In the Dou­bles, Wil­son and Dou­glas reached as far as the quar­ter­fi­nals in the men’s dou­bles while in the mixed dou­bles, Wil­son and Ed­wards-Tay­lor and the pair of Fras­er and Dou­glas were both beat­en in the round-of-16 en­counter. The women’s dou­bles pair of Fras­er and Ed­wards-Tay­lor al­so fell at the last-16 hur­dle.

Youth play­ers take cen­tre stage in Guyana

De­spite their set­backs in the se­nior tour­na­ment, France-based Fras­er and Ed­wards-Tay­lor will be hop­ing for much bet­ter for­tune when they lead T&T’s medal hopes in the Caribbean Youth (Un­der-15 & U-19) Ta­ble Ten­nis Cham­pi­onship which will be­gin at the same venue in Guyana from to­mor­row (Mon­day) un­til April 2.

In ad­di­tion to Fras­er and Ed­wards-Tay­lor, Mikah Stroude and Yz­abelle Mor­ris will com­prise the U-19 girls’ quar­tet while Nico­las Lee, Ja­mali Mauge, Ameer Mo­hamed and Nicholas O’Young make up the U-19 boys’ quar­tet.

In the U-15 Di­vi­sion, Ma­lik Gop­ual who has been train­ing in France will com­bine with Gabriel John, Josi­ah Joseph and Sekel Mc In­tosh and in the girls’ tour­na­ment, Fras­er along with fel­low France-based play­er Jor­dan Thong, Lyl­lana Bood­han, and Ji­nai Samuel.

The pair of Fras­er and Thong are com­ing off of re­cent tour­na­ment wins in Treguier, France while Gopaul was a quar­ter­fi­nal­ist.