Barbados Senior CASA Team Off to a Good Start
The first day of competition in the 2017 Senior Caribbean Area Squash Association (CASA) Championships commenced on Sunday August 13th in St. Vincent & the Grenadines. This year’s Senior CASA Squash Championships served off with competition in the Individual competitions for men and ladies. Three rounds were played in the men’s individuals (R64, R32 and R16) and two rounds in the ladies’ (R32 and R16).
In the ladies competition, the top seed Meagan Best won comfortably against Emma Keene (BER) 3-0 and her #2 seeded teammate Karen Meakins followed suit with a 3-0 win over Marie-Claire Barcant (TT). Both Best and Meakins will advance to the quarterfinals on Monday. The other Barbadian ladies had some tough first round matches but continued to produce some high level of play. In the consolation plate 1st round Barbados junior Jada Smith-Padmore displayed some great skill and athleticism when she came up against Thandi Myers (OECS) to pull off a 3-2 win. Sumairaa Suleman (BAR) despite her small stature produced some powerful shots and kept her opponent constantly thinking and on her toes. Suleman would also take her opponent, Meagan Jackson (BER), to 5 games and would also triumph over Jackson 3-2. In 2015 at Junior CASA in Barbados, junior player Jodi Smith-Padmore would come up against Lara Conolly and Conolly dispatched Smith-Padmore 3-0. Now in 2017 Jodi Smith-Padmore who has been steadily improving, tournament after tournament, would come up against now senior player Conolly and was able to take a game off Conolly despite losing 1-3.
None of the Barbadian men advanced past the round of 16 with the #5/8 seed, Shawn Simpson (BAR) being upset by the dangerous #9/12 seed, Bruce Burrowes (JAM) while brothers Rhett and Bryant Cumberbatch (BAR) both went down 0-3 to #3/4 seed, Micah Franklin (BER) and #2 Cameron Stafford (CAY) respectively. In consolation plate action the young and talented Khamal Cumberbatch ended his very busy day by claiming his third victory in four matches with an impressive 3-1 win over Anthony Fellowes (BER).
Matches continue on Monday August 15th at the National Squash Centre from 8:30 a.m. with the ladies quarterfinals commencing at 11:30 am and the men’s quarterfinals following on from 1:00 p.m.
Katheryn Stewart
PRO – Barbados Squash Association
