By Iva Wharton
The right structure would assist in the development of women’s basketball in Guyana, according to Bernard Daniels, former junior and senior coach for women’s basketball.
Daniels was at the time preparing for a training session at the Cliff Anderson Sports Hall with the girls’ basketball team which left yesterday for Antigua to participate in the annual Gillian Brazier Female Basketball Tournament to be held in Antigua.
According to Daniels, he does not want to run the risk of stepping on toes, but he said that the major challenge is structure.
“Structure and follow-up, when you implement you have to follow-up. I think that is what has been the problem – it has been too disjointed. I am not saying that efforts have not been made, but the follow-up to steer the course, to get to that next level, unfortunately it seems to not have been that consistent.”
Daniels who is here on vacation, said that he plans on volunteering his time to share his knowledge of the sport with the hope of bringing about some development.
Asked about preparation, Daniels said that the girls have tremendous potential: “There is promise there, a lot of raw talent that needs to be honed and enhanced, but unfortunately for this tournament there is not enough time to do that, so I can say that we have to make the best of what is there.”
According to him they will be giving it their best shot because the girls are willing which is a plus: “Willing to make adjustment and the enthusiasm is there, so we work with that and that will give us added strength.”
Senior player Nicola Jacobs said that preparation is great given that the younger players are pulling their weight.”
Their last participation was four years ago when they placed second behind host Antigua. “I think we stand a great chance because we have some players overseas who will be joining us.”
According to her, there is even the possibility of Guyana walking away with the title. Jacobs said that she understands that Guyana would be going up against countries that would have developed from four years ago, but nonetheless they are confident.
