President of the Antigua and Barbuda Golf Association (ABGA), Avery Jonas, has sought to clear the air on the non-selection of top female golfer, Kimesha Anthony, for the recently held Eastern Caribbean Golf Association (ECGA) Championship in Barbados.
Anthony was notably missing from the squad which was announced prior to the tournament held from October 4th to 6th but according to Jonas, the player, who has won several regional tournaments, did not make herself available for selection.
“Kimesha did not make herself available for the selection process, she had declared that she was going to participate in a tournament in the UK at the same time so at the start of the selection process she had indicated that she was going to be unavailable for the team,” he said.
“I think something happened with the UK tournament and it did not fall through, I think, a week or so before the team’s departure to Barbados, but at that time it would not have been fair to the others who had participated in the selection process to kick one of them out,” he added.
Anthony has captured five Barbados Open titles with the last one coming in 2016 and has also won the Trinidad Open tournament.
Jonas said Anthony had no issues with not being able to represent the twin-island state given how the situation unfolded ahead of the team’s departure last week.
“I should note though that Kimesha had not asked or enquired about being in the ECGA team after the UK thing [tournament] did not come through and I say that to say that she fully appreciated that we had already gone through a process and that to circumvent the process at the end to include her would not have been fair to anybody,” he said.
A 12-member team represented Antigua and Barbuda at the championships. The team was headlined by experienced Omorry James in the men’s division. He is joined by Wilston Charles, Demar James and Jonathan Pigott.
Team captain Paul Michael, Dion Massiah and Eldine Baptiste contested the senior division while Patrick Ryan and Lionel O’Brien competed in the super seniors division.
Female players Sarafina Nicholas, Kris Kamajian and Sabienea Winston represented the twin-island state in the female category.