HISTORY WILL?show that the fourth edition of the National Sports Council’s (NSC) Inter-Parish Road Tennis Championships was a tremendous success.
St Michael reconfirmed their supremacy in the indigenous Barbadian sport when the finals climaxed on Friday and Saturday at the Springer Memorial School.
History will also show that the young talent emerging from almost all of the parishes justified the vision of Minister of Youth, Sport and Culture Stephen Lashley in launching the tournament and enlisting the likes of Philip “Foff” Garner and NSC senior coach Anna Shepherd in running with that vision for the past four years.
Nine-year-old Kajay Sealy showed tremendous promise for St Philip, while Junior champion Darius “Barracus” Gaskin of St Michael, Youth winner Ezekiel Ward, 12, of Christ Church, and the consistent Emar Ward of St George, along with Justin Hinds, Dario Hinds and Kyle King, suggest that road tennis has a great future in spite of the advancing years of the “big guns”.
St Michael continue to roll out champion after champion with the deadly duo of Julian “Michael Jackson” White and Mark “Venom” Griffith showing that they have no equals in the “A” Class and Davien “Force Ripe” Taylor in tandem with the flamboyant table tennis national Aaron Barker dominating the “B” Class also.
With players like Antoine Daniel, Jeffrey “Borah” Best, Curtis Jones and Chesterfield Brewster not making it to Springer, St Michael can even produce two more quality teams.
Mercifully, the rise and consistency of St Thomas with the stylish Ricky “Body Doc” Hoyte and Charles Taylor and the class of Kim Holder in turning back veteran Sandra Bailey to win her third successive women’s crown for St George covered over the disappointing performance from Christ Church, who must be considered the best second-placed players in the island.
Few expected Dave Arendell to avenge his ignominious sows at the hand of White in last year’s edition, while the solid Marson Johnson was not viewed capable of stopping the seemingly invincible Griffith.
Similarly, Simon Bayne was seen as producing too much of a drag for Victor “Earth” Ward in their bid to stop Taylor and Barker, with Top 5 player Anthony “Ears” Mitchell opting to be just a spectator for Christ Church.
Ian “Chicken” Yearwood played his fourth successive finals for Christ Church but in spite of an improved effort, suffered from a horrible performance by his partner Peter Moore and failed to deny St Thomas their first crown. Christ Church and all of the other parishes can achieve more if they copy the preparation and execution regime of St Michael.
It was noteworthy that all of the St Michael players stood behind and rallied their players on court and on the night of the finals, a branded and vivacious female provided towels and liquid refreshment for the St Michael players.
Indeed, White and Griffith’s arrival at the venue in a limousine signalled that St Michael were a class above the other teams.
However, the organizers, in spite of the successes, must look at implementing some changes to make the fifth edition even bigger and better.
All efforts must be made to ensure the officials are trained, to guarantee that the officiating remain higher than or on par with the playing.
The strategy of allowing St Michael, Christ Church and St George to enter at the semi-finals stage because they field competitors in all of the categories has been challenged because parishes like St James, St Peter and St Philip were eliminated after playing three and four different parishes in qualifiers.
That approach seemingly protects Christ Church from possible early elimination but at the same time denies their players better preparation for the crucial stages.
Allowing a team to field three players so that a tiebreaker can be implemented in the event of split victories would also remove the complexity of using points totals.
That third player would make room for the excesses in St Michael as well as allow teams options in selection on competition night.
Such adjustments as well as making Springer the home for the Inter Parish finals while Minister Lashley explores the possibility of covering chosen courts in Barbados would ensure the sport is under great coverage with a guaranteed future of islandwide success.
