The National women’s hockey squad has intensified preparations for the Pan American Hockey Challenge in Brazil and Philip Fernandes, Guyana Hockey Board President said this is a critical tournament for the local players.
The tournament to be held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil from July 31-August 7 is organised by the regional body Pan American Hockey Federation (PAHF) and will be used as a qualification competition for the Pan Am tournament.
The PAHF Challenge is a newly instituted tournament which serves as a qualifier for the highly regarded World Cup qualifiers, the Pan American Cup. The top six teams in the Pan American region have already qualified for the Cup and so the PAHF Challenge will be a battle among the remaining teams for the final two positions.
“This is very important tournament for us, we have to perform well to boost the confidence of hockey locally and at the same time create a positive situation where we can go out and secure sponsorship because of the showing at this level of competition,” Fernandes who is also head coach of the squad told Stabroek Sport.
Fernandes said that last year’s showing at the Central American and Caribbean (CAC) tournament was inspirational following Guyana emerging in sixth place in the eight-team event.
“Despite being the only nation in the tournament without an artificial hockey pitch, Guyana’s performance, which included a 1-1 draw against bronze medallists Barbados and a narrow 0-1 loss to fifth placed Jamaica, came into high praise from PAHF officials in attendance,” he added.
The GHB named a squad of 22 players consisting largely of players who competed in the CAC Games last year.
Guyana will have a difficult task in competing against several teams which are ranked higher on the Pan American table.
These include Uruguay, Cuba, Brazil, Barbados and Jamaica among others. While Guyana have never played against Uruguay and Cuba, in their last meeting they lost to both Brazil (2005) and Jamaica (2010) and draw against Barbados (2010).
According to Fernandes, Cuba and Uruguay are probably the strongest teams in the competition while Brazil has also recently been the beneficiary of a great deal of financing and resources from the International Hockey Federation (FIH) and the Brazilian Olympic Committee (BOC) in preparation for the 2016 Olympics to be held in Rio de Janeiro.
In addition to the successful national team of 2010, the GHB have included in their squad one overseas-based player as a possible addition to the team and also several promising junior players who will benefit from the training with a view to ensuring longevity of the team.
The final squad will be selected before the end of June from the players called.
Training sessions are being held at the Georgetown Cricket Club (GCC) and the National Gymnasium on Mandela Avenue under the guidance of Fernandes and assistant coach Rawl Davson.
The players in training are: Alysa Xavier, Natalie Hing, Jonelle Webster, Trisha Woodroffe, Tiffany Solomon, Vashema Bourne, Tricia Fiedtkou, Marzena Fiedtkou, Talia Fiedtkou, Marisha Rodrigues, Maria Munroe, Chantelle Fernandes, Amanda Garnett, Ulrica Sutherland, Gabriella Xavier, Dominique DeGroot, Kerensa Fernandes, Avonda James, Leigh Sandison, Samantha Fernandes, Macaela Harding and Ashley DeGroot.
