Mr. Barry Faguy, a World Squash Federation International Referee (IR), from Canada conducted a short training seminar for certified local squash referees on Saturday, March 14, 2009 in the meeting room of the Barbados Olympic Association?s Olympic Centre building in the Garfield Sobers Sports Complex in Wildey, St. Michael, Barbados.
Mr. Faguy is one of only 15 IRs in the world, and the only one in this hemisphere. He is one of the top squash referees in the world, and has conducted several mini-clinics for referees in Barbados in the past and made himself available to the Barbados Squash Rackets Association once again when he was here on the island.
President of the Barbados Squash Rackets Association (BSRA), Craig Archer, who is also the coordinator of the Caribbean Officiating Programme for Squash (COPS), was delighted with the training and knowledge imparted by Mr. Faguy.
?I am very pleased with how the two hour session went.? Archer said. ?We had 15 participants, including all of the locally based Level B referees who were in the island at the time. Two attendees were from overseas, including the President of the OECS Squash Association, Dr. Sherian Slater, who popped over from St. Vincent for the day just to be with us! There was a good exchange of ideas between the local referees and Barry Faguy, who has been a tremendous friend to Barbados over the years, as has Squash Canada. The attendance was quite good, with almost half of the locally certified referees turning up last Saturday afternoon. We really couldn?t have asked for more.”
Archer went on: “The subject matter was relevant and topical. Mr. Faguy explained the reasoning behind the WSF?s decision to adopt point a rally (PAR) scoring to 11 as the universal standard scoring system for squash. This new system will go into effect worldwide on April 1, 2009. Barry explained how this new scoring system works. He was very thorough, as usual, and his presentation was well received by all of us who were fortunate enough to be there.?
The other topics covered by Mr. Faguy were the history and implementation of the 3-referee system, which is mainly used at the elite levels of the professional game. The BSRA will begin to officially use the new PAR scoring system at the National Junior Championships, scheduled for April 17-19, 2009. The next local tournaments after that will be the National Veterans Championships (May 5-9th) and the Senior Championships from (May 11-16th) all at the Barbados Squash Club, Marine Gardens.
