Cameron Wong and Zachery Byng spearheaded the T&T girls and boys teams which left Piarco on Tuesday to compete at the upcoming prestigious JITIC Under-14 boys and girls competitions as well as the Copa Munda Maya tournament.
The JITIC Girls and Boys Under-14 Championship will take place in Guatemala from June 25 to July 1 followed by the Copa Mundo Maya from July 3 to 8 also in Guatemala.
The teams are expected to arrive in Guatemala on June 24 with the round-robin singles matches in the JITIC event serving off on June 26 and continuing on June 27, and 28 ahead of the main draw, second draws, and doubles from June 28 to July, 1 at the Complejo de Tenis de la Federación Nacional de Tenis de Guatemala.
In addition to Wong, the trio of Jaeda-Lee Daniel-Joseph Jordane Dookie and Brianna Harricharan are the other members of the girl's team.
The T&T girls team is among the favourites with Wong presently ranked as the top player in the Confederation of Tennis of Central America and the Caribbean (COTECC), Daniel-Joseph fourth, and Dookie, seventh, while Harricharan having excelled in the National Junior Catch Championship held in March, has a national ranking of fourth in the girls Under-14 girls category.
With a similar potential to the girls, the national junior boy's team comprises top juniors, Dalla Costa,
Zachery Byng, Isaiah Boxhill and Kayden Siewrattan. Byng is currently ranked fifth in COTECC while Dalla Costa and Boxhill have shown true skill, grit and determination on local soil at the CATCH tournament and have national rankings of first and fourth respectively.
The teams will be led by national coaches Jerome Ward and Carlista Mohammed both of whom have represented T&T at the highest levels of competition, and continue to share their experience and guide our next generation of athletes.
The contingent will arrive in Guatemala in solid form, despite our COVID 19 pandemic restrictions.
After receiving local exemptions to travel, players engaged in intensive training sessions in a Florida, USA based camp over the last two weeks in preparation for the tournament.
The Tennis Association looks forward to our athletes competing well at these events as we continue to provide opportunities for all of them to succeed.
Tennis TT wishes to express gratitude to the parents for working with the Association in navigating these difficult times while getting the players ready for the tournaments.