Cumberbatch, Prow repeat as Caribbean champs

Individual action continued on Tuesday evening in Georgetown, Guyana, with the men’s and women’s finals in the 2024 ENET Senior Caribbean Championships. Under the auspices of the Caribbean Area Squash Association (CASA), the championships include competition for men and women in Open, 40+, 50+, and 60+ age groups.

Whereas Guyana are defending team champions, Barbados have been the top dogs in one-on-one play of late. Defending men’s champion Khamal Cumberbatch contested his third consecutive final on Tuesday evening. The only other Barbadian to reach a Senior CASA men’s final was his eldest brother, Gavin, who won his gold medal in 2007.

Barbadian women have been even more dominant. The CASA Senior Championships have been contested since 1977. In the last 15 years, dating back to 2005, however, Bajan women have contested 14 finals, winning six of them.

This time around, both 2023 champions were out to etch their names even further in history’s page.

The action got underway on Court 3 with the women’s final. Prow, a winner last year over Guyana’s Nicolette Fernandes, this time met another Guyanese woman, Mary Fung-A-Fat. The latter was a losing finalist in 2014, when Barbados hosted CASA.

And the diminutive Fung-A-Fat was a losing finalist again a decade later, as the top-seeded Prow breezed past her, winning 11-6, 11-2, 11-7. Prow pushed her opponent around the court, seemingly effortlessly, to take the gold in dominant fashion.

The reigning men’s champ and losing 2022 finalist had a slightly tougher proposition on his hands, in the person of Julian Jervis from the Cayman Islands. Jervis gave all he had in the first two sets, but Cumberbatch was able to stake himself to a two-set lead, 13-11, 11-9. In the final rubberer, it was straight work for Cumberbatch, winning 11-5 to take the gold.

Also making the women’s semifinal was Barbados’s Amanda Haywood. She lost to Prow on Monday night, whilst 2022 winner Ashley Khalil lost to Mary Fung-A-Fat. On Tuesday, in advance of the finals matchups, Haywood came through a nail biting seesaw battle to take third place in five sets: 11-9, 9-11, 13-11, 9-11, 11-6.

President of the Barbados Squash Racquets Association, Craig Archer applauded the achievements of the two champions.

“Fantastic performances from both defending champions, Margot Prow, and Khamal Cumberbatch to repeat as champions and both from the same country,” he told Barbados TODAY. “Truly epic and never been done before. Back to back champions from the same country.

“Also really pleased for Amanda Haywood to win the bronze medal against a former Caribbean Ladies Champion, Ashley Khalil. Now for the doubles and onto the team event. Go Barbados!”

The champions teamed up for mixed doubles as well, taking down the Caymanian pair of Kion Knights and Sydney Wallace 11-1, 11-3 in the opening round of play. They now play the top-ranked Jamaican team of Dane Schwier and Sanjana Nallapati in Wednesday’s semifinals.

Darien Benn and Shawn Simpson will play men’s doubles on Wednesday morning against Leonel Sorrillo and Seth Thong of TRinidad & Tobago. Haywood and Sumaira Suleman got a first-round bye in the women’s doubles. They meet the Cayman Islands duo of Michaela Rensburg and Emma Turnbull in the semifinals on Wednesday morning.

(TF)