In their first public comments since Guyana lifted the NACRA 15s championship, the Guyana Rugby Football Union (GRFU) and national captain, Ryan Gonsalves hailed the players as heroes while calling on more support for the discipline.
After 43 years, the national rugby outfit returned to Guyana with the champion’s trophy following a monumental comeback. The ‘Green Machine’ went into robot mode against USA South in Atlanta on Saturday and defeated the host 30-27 after trailing 24-8 at halftime.
“I’m very proud after an absence of 43 years Guyana has managed to capture the overall NACRA 15s championship” a proud president of the union, Peter Green said on Tuesday at GOA’s headquarters.
“This team in particular has pulled out the stops against the highest ranked team in NACRA. We went into the competition ranked #5 but now we are #1 which means we have the rights to host the competition at home next year.
“Guyana has an enviable record since we have been winners or runners-up for the last six years straight in the 7s but now we have won the 15s and we hope the government is looking at our achievements”, he stated.
While commending the team, Green was the bearer of bad news, stating that the union is still in the red in the neighbourhood of $1.5M and called on the government to reward the players for winning the championship.
Gonsalves stated that the team must not rest on their laurels and in order to stay in sublime form, the team “needs to play more international matches.”
He added that “the 15s title completed us as a rugby nation” since “it improved our ranking.”
Gonsalves added that “Everyone can confess that this was our hardest game ever but I must say thumbs up to my team, we fought and kept applying pressure and we forced our way to some crucial tries.”
The national captain praised his team for holding the opposition to just three points in the second half and overtime and singled out senior players, Ronald Mayers, Vallon Adams, Theo Henry and others for playing crucial roles in their historic comeback victory.
Coach/manager of the campaign, Kenneth Grant-Stuart then thanked the team’s support base in Atlanta and spoke highly of the GRFU’s executive while echoing the sentiments of Green with regards for more support.
As the FIFA World Cup fever heats up Brazil and the rest of the globe, the union’s officials were quick to point out, that the national rugby team is now ranked higher (50) than its football counterpart.
Despite this fact the team still needed funds to cover the cost of meals.
Like several other “minor” sporting branches in Guyana, rugby suffers from a lack of funding that is holding back its development and blocking the game from breaking into the local mainstream sporting mentality. With Guyana’s win on Saturday, it should send a clear message both to the rugby world and to decision makers here in Guyana. (Emmerson Campbell)
