Writer: Brian Kazaara
Campion College has a rich history of success in Badminton – our school has produced several national badminton players including Kyle Wong, Kraig Simpson, Anthonio Foster, Christopher Beecher, Ryan Chung, Keri Wong, amongst others. From this list, Kyle Wong and Keri Wong have both won medals for Jamaica.
The Campion College Badminton team also has a history of excellence in competitive events over the years. In recent times Campion capped a memorable set of performances by winning the 2004/2005 senior league season and also impressing in the knockout tournament. In 2005/2006 the senior team came second in the annual knockout tournament.
However, those glory days are in the past and Campion’s dominance in the world of inter-secondary school badminton has waned. A look towards building a long term squad of players has now been adopted; as such, our future is looking bright. This new approach has been engineered by the Coach Prudence Brown, Vice Captain, Kenneth Yu and the Captain Gregory Robinson.
Captain Gregory knows about succeeding at this level, as he can boast of a number of achievements during his time at Campion. These include leading Campion’s junior team to two consecutive third place spots in the ’06-’08 seasons. In this time he held the vice-captain and captain spot respectively. He has won the Magis Award for Badminton for two years running (’07-’09) and has also won the prefect award for badminton once in his junior years. He has been recruited by the Jamaica Badminton Association twice, the first time at the tender age of eleven. In addition, he was won two local doubles competition, and, due to his performances on the local scene, has been moved up one division.
Gregory, Kenneth and the coach are now currently trying to invigorate the team with emphasis on the lifeline of any sports team – the youth squad.
“We’re having some difficulties in the senior team,” Gregory commented, “however Kenneth and I, along with the coach, are trying to bring them up so as to bring the competition to the schools. Get CC back on winning terms. Some of us are lacking that winning drive and we’re doing this in an attempt to rediscover it.”
One way in which Gregory intends to change this is with his policy of developing the physical side of the team’s game. Lack of dedication is unacceptable and he believes that hard work and fun can co-exist as it has before. He believes that only through continuous hard work can a high standard be maintained. During one of the team’s training sessions he explained, “I run drills and check on court movement amongst other things in an effort to keep the basics in check. Many of them want to play; what they don’t understand is that I didn’t become the player I am just by playing. Basics have to come first. They need to know I had to do things right to get there.”
Under the guidance of the leadership trinity of the captain, vice-captain and the coach, the team seems more than capable of returning Campion to the top of the high school Badminton Ladder.
The team has an open membership policy for anyone interested in joining. They train on Tuesday in the auditorium from 3-5 p.m., and at the Chinese Benevolent Association on Thursdays for the same time.