A Guyana team comprising members of the Hornets and the Yamaha Caribs Rugby Football Club recently copped the Caribbean International Rugby 7’s Overall Women’s 2008 Championship title.
In the tournament played on December 6 and 7 at St. Mary’s ground in Trinidad and Tobago, (T&T) the Guyanese lost only one of their six matches and that was to the team they defeated in the finals, the USA Atlantis.
According to president of the Guyana Rugby Football Union (GRFU) Noel Adonis, the two-day competition saw a disciplined display by the team as they ripped aside the Barbados national team in their first encounter 44-0. In their second game of the day, they fought a spirited battle against the Royaliens from T&T and won 24-10.
According to captain Sabola Gray the team realized that they were coming up against the defending and five-times champion Atlantis and had an attack of nerves and they crumbled to a 0-22 loss.
The team under the watchful eyes of coach Elwin Chase, assistant coach Troy Yhip and manager Charles Graves, made sure that they came up with a comprehensive game plan for their remaining two round robin games. Their plan, however, was affected by bouts of diarrhoea and vomiting and this left some of the players dehydrated, with one even visiting the doctor.
This, according to Chase, did not affect the spirit of the girls as they rebounded admirably to beat Undertakers, a combined St. Vincent and St. Lucia team 33-0 and then the T& T team Aranguez Roman 24-0.
The Guyana team at this stage placed second to Atlantis and so they were pitted against them in the finals.
In the finals the Guyana team was allowed the luxury of fielding two guest players as the tournament rules made provision for this in the finals. The team opted for Juliana Straker and Quanese John from the Royaliens whom they had beaten in one of the games played on Saturday.
Meanwhile, Chase said, the girls had a team chant that they recited before every game, ‘togetherness’. Additionally they realized one thing – “they knew what they had to do and did it.”
The assistant coach added that the girls “played according to the standard they had set and defence was key.”
In the finals Guyana posted the first score on the board and Atlantis replied but afterwards the Guyanese played as though they had received “divine” inspiration and plucked the feathers of the Atlantis girls and ran home winners via a 29-5 scoreline.
In addition to walking away with the 2008 trophy the team was surprised when they were presented with US$500 for their victory.
Meanwhile, the president of the GRFU said that the team’s cost was borne by sponsors from whom the girls solicited funds while additional help also came from the GRFU.
Gray also called on the GRFU to start looking into the affairs of women rugby players as they had done what the men’s team was unable to do. The 2009 season, she added, will see the girls bringing more glory to their homeland and a team made up of players from more clubs will be selected soon.