players from whom the team for the 2000 Junior Pan-Am Games Championships will be chosen.

The initial squad chosen last May consisted of some 43 players who have been training under the guidance of coaches Kath Davis, Steven Moreton and Dai Hermann-Smith. The squad is managed by Sarah Cook.

In July of this year, 29 of the players went as the `Island Girls' on a tour to Vancouver where they trained on artificial turf for over 15 hours and played 14 fixtures in eight days, winning six, drawing six and losing only two against various teams from British Columbia.

The Junior Pan Am Games are being held in Barbados between April 10 and 20 next year. Other nations expected to attend are Argentina, the current world number three team Canada and United States, who both played in the last World Championships, Chile, Jamaica, Barbados, Trinidad and Tobago, Mexico, Venezuela and perhaps Paraguay and Uruguay.

Two nations only from these games will advance to the World Junior Championships in Argentina in 2001.

In January, 1997, in Chile, the last time these games were held, Bermuda finished seventh out of 10 nations above Venezuela, Paraguay and Mexico. That was Bermuda's first time at the championships and they took an inexperienced squad with an average age of 161 and were overwhelmed with their results.

Of this year's final 25 squad players, there is much more maturity and experience but without an artificial surface in Bermuda to train on, the results realistically cannot be expected to improve.

Seven of the squad have already played at senior international level and two more at under-21 level.

Eight of the squad played in Chile two years ago -- Danielle Skinner, Alex Lewis, Caroline Black, Chrisanthi Bartley, Hannah Ellison, Megan Spurling, Sharmini Thamotheram and Megan Leitch.

They join in the squad Bonnie Leibowitch who played in the 1998 Caribbean and Central American Championships alongside Skinner, Lewis, Black, Bartley, Ellison and Spurling.

These more experienced players will be joined by a promising group of youngsters who play in the local league for either Canaries or Swifts. The youngest is 14-year-old Sarah Cooper.

The final squad of 16 players is expected to be announced in February.

Full training squad: Goalkeepers -- Jennah Robinson, Alex Lewis (both Swifts); defenders -- Laura Robinson (Canaries), Lisete Moniz, Anne Marwick, Claire Dorrington (all Swifts), Suelan Veale (Cardinals), Sharmini Thamotheram (Swifts), Bonnie Leibowitch (Edinburgh University), Danielle Skinner (Ohio University); midfielders -- Sarah Cooper, Megan Leitch (both Swifts), Emma Holmes (Guelph University), Melissa Durrant, Cathie Hay (both Swifts), Iesha Castle, Hayley Faries, Jessica Sousa (All Cardinals), Caroline Black (Springfield College); forwards -- Erica Frith (Swifts), Hannah Ellison (McGill University), Christanthi Bartley, Fiona Lee, Kim Frith (all Swifts), Megan Spurling (Kent University).