Barbados Badminton Players shine in Trinidad

Four Barbados players from the Shuttlers Badminton Club turned in an outstanding performance when they travelled to Trinidad and Tobago recently to compete in the Solo Open Championships from October 20th-23rd.

With about 75 competitors Cory Fanus and Dakeil Thorpe were the only two Barbadian players at the tournament and turned in an outstanding performance.

Fanus is the reigning Barbados National seniors champion, and he reached the final in both the singles and doubles. However though he brought back the gold with his countryman Thorpe, he had to settle for silver in the singles. Fanus said that the edge his opponent had was that he was a bit more attacking but admitted that he is not at peek form as yet.

As Fanus looks to improve he said that his form was still under construction and he has a lot more work to do. Thorpe said that the tournament had highs and lows. Admitting that he was lacking some preparation for the singles, a disappointed Thorpe was knocked out in the quarter finals. Thorpe said he lost focus in his game after he felt he had some bad calls from the officials. Both Thorpe and Fanus are hoping to make the Commonwealth team in 2018 and are training with that in mind.

Fanus who is a final year student at the University of the West Indies Cave Hill Campus said he currently trains 4-5 days a week, twice a day. “Physical work on mornings and technical work on evenings,” said Fanus. Thorpe who has a greater challenge with work commitments is currently hoping to increase his training time. But it wasn’t the seniors alone who enjoyed a successful outting in Trinidad as two Junior Harrison Griffith and Joshua Valere also had an outstanding performance. Valere a 10-year-old student at St. Angela’s was the Boys Under-11 singles champion. Valere who competed at Carebaco regional tournament where he won gold and silver said that in Trinidad it was a lot of moving around. Despite this, Valere who said he has been playing Badminton for four years after he first started playing with his sister when he got a set for Christmas, worked his way tot he final and won.

Valere then teamed up with 11-year-old Griffith for the doubles and they placed second. Griffith who is a student at Christ Church Foundation School said that it was a good experience as he also placed third in the singles. He is also a former student of St. Angela’s and believes that though he likes where his game is at, he can improve on some areas. One such area which he pointed out was the mental training. The players returned home last week and were immediately back at training the next day.(CG)