This year’s GT&T sponsored National Indoor Hockey tournament has been rescheduled and is likely to take place early next year at the Cliff Anderson Sports Hall, President of the Guyana Hockey Board (GHB) Philip Fernandes has disclosed.
The Indoor tournament is normally used to select the teams to represent Guyana at the Annual Diamond Mineral Water International Hockey Festival but according to Fernandes, the core of the country’s leading hockey players is currently training for the inaugural PAHF Caribbean Cup championships in Trinidad and Tobago next month.
Guyana will be fielding both male and female teams in the regional outdoor tournament slated for November 7-11 in Port of Spain.
Fernandes said that the GHB will be looking at the date in January once the Sports Hall is available.
Both squads are currently training four times weekly at the Georgetown Cricket Club ground and the training is expected to intensify leading up to their departure.
Fernandes said he had discussions with GT&T’s public relations officer Alison Parker to notify her of the change.
The national indoor tournament is normally held around this time and is used as a warm up for the local players participating in the International Indoor Festival.
Fernandes disclosed as a media briefing earlier this week that Georgetown Cricket Club, Everest Hikers and Old Fort are the three clubs to represent Guyana at the Indoor Festival in both male and female categories, while Carib Degenerates will compete in the Veterans’ division.
Fernandes said teams are likely to receive training time at the Sports Hall prior to the Festival
The Sports Hall was recently rehabilitated in preparation for the Inter-Guiana Games involving Suriname, French Guiana and hosts Guyana which opened yesterday.
Fernandes said the National Sports Commission (NSC) and Director of Sport Neil Kumar, have been supportive of the GHB.
He said the constant upgrades of the indoor facility are welcomed and once the floor can be brought up to international standards the Board will be able to host top class indoor teams from Europe and even farther afield.
Hockey players have had a busy schedule since August with the staging of the Banks DIH/Infab Night tournament and will run into the first week in December following the conclusion of the Indoor Festival.