UNDISPUTED squash queen Karen Meakins duly claimed an unprecedented 13th successive national championship on Saturday night.
She brushed past teenager Gylla Mackenzie 11-3, 11-1, 11-3 in the final of the women’s open at the Barbados Squash Club.
The men’s title went to Gavin Cumberbatch, who claimed his fourth national success with an 11-7, 12-10, 11-9 win over Shawn Simpson when the curtain came down on the Barbados Olympics Association-sponsored national championships.
Meakins, who has won medals for Barbados at the Caribbean level, CAC Games and at the World Masters Championships, faced her youngest ever opponent in a final. The talented Mackenzie, who will celebrate her 16th birthday this month, has already won multiple junior trophies, including the last four Girls’ Under-19 national titles.
She tried hard and impressed the spectators on several occasions with her determination in each rally and kept fighting right to the end, but there was only ever going to be one winner.
Cumberbatch and Simpson, two close friends and rivals, contested the men’s final for the sixth time in eight years.
After a slightly nervous start, both players settled down and played at a high tempo and extended the rallies by playing the ball at extreme pace into the back corners
Both the tall left-handed Simpson and the shorter right-handed Cumberbatch tended to play crosscourt shots to each other’s backhand side and continually amazed spectators with their court coverage and retrieving ability.
Earlier, Cumberbatch’s brothers, Bryant and Rhett, played a competitive third-place play-off match.
The younger brother, Bryant, triumphed 13-11, 11-9, 11-4, in a match that contained long rallies at great pace with accurate volleys and drop shots by both players.
The evergreen Mark Sealy, a former Barbados cricket and hockey representative, took fifth place by defeating Zaki Williams 11-6, 11-5, 11-8, while Andy Gill was seventh after beating Ryan Foster 11-9, 11-9, 11-7.
In women’s action, Lilianna White comfortably defeated Ayoni Bradshaw 11-7, 11-5, 11-5 to clinch third place, while junior players contested the fifth-place play-off with 13-year-old Amanda Haywood getting the better of 11-year-old Meagan Best 11-5, 11-6, 11-7 in an entertaining match.
The experienced Cilla Seale defeated tournament debutant Tammy Vamvakas 11-8, 11-2, 11-7 to take seventh place. (HG)
