T&T under-15 boys secure t-tennis bronze

Trinidad and To­ba­go’s boys’ un­der-15 team of Ma­teo Mollineau, Daniel Bhim, Ethan Mo­hammed and Jared Si­mon added a third bronze medal when the team com­pe­ti­tions at the In­ter­na­tion­al Ta­ble Ten­nis Fed­er­a­tion (IT­TF) Amer­i­c­as Caribbean Youth Cham­pi­onships end­ed in San­to Domin­go, Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic on Sun­day.

In their open­ing match yes­ter­day, the T&T Un­der-15 boys came up against Ja­maica in a vir­tu­al bat­tle for the bronze medal, at least in the five-team round-robin se­ries ahead of their fi­nal match at the ren­o­vat­ed ta­ble ten­nis pavil­ion of Par­que del Este.

Mollineau was the hero for the T&T boys, win­ning the open­ing match and then clinch­ing vic­to­ry, sav­ing a match point as well in his lat­ter win.

In the open­ing tie of the best-of-five se­ries, Mollineau de­feat­ed An­tho­ny Bird 12-10, 11-8 and 11-9, and Bhim eased past Ajani Spencer 11-7, 11-7 and 11-8 for a 2-0 T&T lead.

How­ev­er, Ja­maica man­aged to stave off de­feat via Kyle John­son’s 11-8, 11-8, 6-11, 11-4 win over T&T’s Si­mon be­fore Mollineau re­turned to seal the win for T&T with an en­thralling come-from-be­hind win over Spencer 10-12, 7-11, 11-4, 11-9, 13-11 to im­prove his team to 2-1 ahead of their fi­nal match with Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic, who al­so had a 2-1 record, in a clash for the sil­ver medal.

How­ev­er, the T&T boys’ team could not re­peat their ear­li­er tri­umph and end­ed their cam­paign with a 0-3 loss to the Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic, fin­ish­ing with a 2-2 win-loss record and third spot in the five-team stand­ings.

This af­ter Ja­cob Sanchez brushed aside Bhim 11-7, 11-6, 11-7; Ed­win Ven­tu­ra then edged past Mollineau 9-11, 11-7, 8-11, 11-7, 11-8, and An­gel Dominguez out­last­ed Ethan Mo­hammed 9-11, 11-8, 11-4, 8-11, 10-12.

Puer­to Ri­co al­so won their clash with Bar­ba­dos 3-0 for a third straight win and fol­lowed it up with a sim­i­lar out­come over Ja­maica to take the gold medal.

Go­ing in­to yes­ter­day’s match­es, Ja­maica al­so had a 1-1 record af­ter a 3-1 de­feat of Bar­ba­dos on Fri­day, which came af­ter a 0-3 loss to the Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic, who led with a 2-1 record, fol­lowed by un­beat­en Puer­to Ri­co, who had a match in hand.

On Sat­ur­day, T&T end­ed the day with a 1-1 win-loss record in the five-team round-robin pool af­ter be­ing hum­bled by Puer­to Ri­co 0-3 on Sun­day.

For the Puer­to Ri­cans, Matthew Cao dis­missed Bhim 11-4, 11-4, 11-5; An­gel Me­len­dez over­whelmed Mollineau 11-5, 8-11, 15-13, 11-7; and Se­bas­t­ian Pe­draza beat Ethan Mo­hammed 11-7, 11-6, 11-6.

When the tour­na­ment served off on Fri­day, T&T’s Un­der-15 boys start­ed with a 3-1 win over Bar­ba­dos, with Mollineau beat­ing Nyal Bushell 11-4, 11-8, and 11-5 in the open­er be­fore Maleeq Aimey drew Bar­ba­dos lev­el by eas­ing past Bhim 11-6, 7-11, 11-8, and 11-9.

Mo­hammed then re­stored T&T’s lead at 2-1 cour­tesy of his 11-4, 11-6, 11-5 win over Allen Williams be­fore Mollineau re­turned to bat­tle past Aimey 4-11, 11-9, 11-8, 8-11, 11-6 to seal the team win.

Al­so on Sat­ur­day, the T&T girls’ Un­der-19 team of France-based Chloe Fras­er, Jor­dan Thong and Jan­nah Mo­hammed, as well as the boys’ Un­der-19 team of Jonathan Cot­toy, Josi­ah Joseph, Raees Elahie and Ma­lik Gopaul, both won bronze medals in their re­spec­tive com­pe­ti­tions.

To­day, the sin­gles com­pe­ti­tion will serve off with all the T&T play­ers in ac­tion in their re­spec­tive round-robin pools, which will con­clude on Tues­day, with the top two play­ers ad­vanc­ing to the main draw knock­out stages.

In the Boys Un­der-19, Joseph com­petes in Group Two against Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic’s Rafael Cabr­era and Bar­ba­di­an Mikail Mark; Gopaul is in Group Six along­side Puer­to Ri­co’s Ryan Cuadro, Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic’s Juan Ro­driguez and Bar­ba­di­an Jashom Smith; Cot­toy com­petes in Group Sev­en ver­sus St Lu­cian Manie Eleuthere, Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic’s Samuel Fer­sobe and Aruban Wal­lace Fan, while Elahie faces An­tigua and Bar­bu­da’s Mekhi Sim­mons, Ja­maica’s Joel Lamm and Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic’s Di­anel­gi Sev­eri­no in Group Eight.

Fras­er will con­test Group Three of the Girls Un­der-19 sin­gles against St Lu­cian Shatal Charles and Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic’s Ar­i­an­na Mejia, and Thong meets host pair Dafne Sosa and Lori­mar Her­nan­dez in Group Five.

Bhim will con­test Group Three of the Un­der-15 boys’ sin­gles with Puer­to Ri­can An­gel Me­len­dez, Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic’s Ed­win Ven­tu­ra and Ja­maican Khalil Hall; Mollineau bat­tles Puer­to Ri­co’s Jose Rivera and home­town pair Ja­mal Adames and Noel Sanchez in Group Four; Mo­hammed faces Puer­to Ri­co’s Se­bastien Pe­draza, Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic’s Ron­ny Sanchez and Ja­maican Kyle John­son in Group Five, while Si­mon is in Group Sev­en with Ja­maican An­tho­ny Bird, Bar­ba­di­an Maleeq Aimey and Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic’s An­gel Dominguez.

Mo­hammed is T&T’s lone en­trant in the Un­der-15 girls’ cat­e­go­ry and com­petes in Group Five ver­sus Ja­maican Tahier­ra Al­li­son and lo­cal duo Eliana Mar­tinez and Vi­o­let Jimenez.