Calypso Girls plunge to 10th

KINGSTON:  Trinidad and Tobago Calypso Girls netballers have been relegated to 10th ranked in world netball. It happened at the National Sports Centre here yesterday, when they crashed to a shocking 52-50 defeat by the United States at the 2003 Cable & Wireless 11th World Netball Champion-ships. This means, the Calypso Girls have plunged two places, having entered the tournament as the 8th ranked team and will now have to play with  the minnows to qualify to play among the top 12 in the next championships. Yesterday the USA, beaten 48-42 by the Calypso Girls in an earlier meeting, played with purpose, unlike the Trinidadians who seemed to be just going through the motions, and the American team laced with several Caribbean-born players led 16-13 at the end of the first quarter.  The Calypso Girls regained the initiative in the second period however, as  happened in earlier games, to outscore the opposition 17-13 to lead at the half 30-29.

Diehard Trinis at the Centre shouted their support but once again the Calypso Girls disappointed, particularly in the centre court, and our worst fears came back to haunt us. Goal-shoot Janelle Barker the perennial bright spark gave the Trinidadians a four-goal lead early in the third quarter, but the USA girls  made use of several turnovers to draw level at the end of the period 39-39. Barker was switched to goal-attack and Simone Morgan was handed the goal-shoot bib, and this worked and there was promise of a happy ending but it proved to be only a promise, as with the scores knotted up with just over three minutes to play, goal-defence Denesha Moses threw a long cross-court pass which was intercepted and the USA scored to move ahead and kept the lead to the end. Morgan finished with 30 goals from 33 attempts and Barker had 20 from 26, while ex-Jamaican national Georgina Hibbert scored 46 goals of 54 attempts.

Other scores: HONG KONG (39) vs CAYMANS ISLANDS (36); CANADA (43) vs BERMUDA (33);  ANTIGUA/BARBUDA (65) vs SRI LANKA (60); SCOTLAND (39) vs ST  LUCIA (35); ST. VINCENT/GRENADINES (51) vs  WALES (30); COOK ISLAND (49) vs NUIE (39); NORTHERN IRELAND (49) vs GRENADA (38).
Quarter finals: AUSTRALIA (62) BARBADOS (35); ENGLAND (44) vs SOUTH AFRICA (41)
Today’s semi-finals: Australia vs England; Jamaica vs New Zealand.