Bermuda?s squash team will be able to take on the world on a more even footing following their debut at the sport?s premier championship.

The Island failed to win a match at the Men?s World Team Championship in Vienna, Austria earlier this month. But director of squash, Ross Triffitt, said he was proud of the efforts of Nick Kyme, James Stout and Sam Stevens and said their performances boded well for future years.

Missing their number two player, Tommy Sherratt, who was unavailable, the trio secured 28th place out of 30, going down to eventual semi-finalists Egypt, Finland (twice), Italy, Hong Kong and Korea. They won two individual games, Kyme the victor in the matches against Hong Kong and Korea.

The World Championships are held every two years and Triffitt said that would give Bermuda plenty of time to work on their deficiencies.

?The team being split up a little bit and doing their own thing, prior to the event, perhaps didn?t help us,? said Triffitt. ?It would have been good if we could all have got together a week before and had the opportunity to play a lead-up event to help them get some confidence and experience against the real top players. That might have made a difference.

?The real weak point is that these other countries are putting in 150 percent and are prepared to run themselves into the ground. Our guys aren?t used to that level of competition all the time. In the Caribbean and the Pan American region the players tend to be a little more relaxed, whereas in Vienna everyone was doing their best for their country.

?Also, our number two player wasn?t available and when you factor that in we went away without having a reserve and all three guys had to play all the matches. We would have benefited a great deal from resting and rotating the players.?

Triffitt said there were many positives to be taken from their time in Europe.

?There is no question that the boys gave a good effort and some individual performances were excellent,? he said. ?I think Nick can hold his head up high. He won two out of his five matches and the people he lost to were ranked in the top 30 in the world. That was a very respectable performance.

?I think the boys felt the pressure and perhaps didn?t play as well as they could in some instances. There were no easy matches, no opportunity to get any confidence with a slightly easier run. That went on all the way through the week, coming down to the very tight match against Korea on the final day. We ended up losing the match by a couple of points.

?But there was a tremendous benefit in them going and gaining the experience at that sort of level. It?s more obvious now that they need to be at that level to have a clearer understanding of what they need to do to be competitive against these guys.?

Bermuda were runaway victors in the recent Caribbean championships and Triffitt believes the players may have got a little ahead of themselves on their arrival at the Worlds.

?Going from the Caribbean, where we were totally dominant, perhaps we took a couple of the teams a little lightly,? he said. ?We turned up there and realised this is the World Championships and there are aren?t going to be any easy matches.

?The boys always had to perform to their best and perhaps we didn?t do that on a couple of occasions.?

While at the tournament the Bermuda team were in regular contact with Bermuda-based Australian David Palmer, whose team went on to lift the title against France.

?Dave was fantastic throughout our whole campaign,? said Triffitt. ?He came over and gave us a lot of support. Both he, his fellow Australians and some of the Scots, who had also been here, were offering us a lot of support. When it came to the final the whole Bermuda contingent were there screaming Australia on.?

On the domestic front, this weekend sees the start of the AF Smith Corporate Team Tournament at the Bermuda Squash Racquets Association. It runs all next week with the finals on Saturday, November 8.