Geordine Henry - file photos

He's a bit of a poster boy for Jamaican badminton and four years after creating history, Gareth Henry is returning to the Commonwealth Games stage, looking to chart a new course and lift the sport locally.

Henry left the island on Wednesday evening, along with Garron Palmer, Ruth Williams and his sister Geordine Henry. The badminton contingent is completed by coach, Dr Kingsley Ford, and manager Ricardo Teape.

Back in 2010, while competing at the Delhi Games, Henry, who actually had to get the better of Palmer in the earlier round, progressed to the Round of 16 of the men's singles tournament, becoming the first Jamaican to progress to that point at the Commonwealth Games.

More experienced and more prepared, Henry is at least looking to repeat that performance at the July 23 - August 3 multi-event competition set for Glasgow, Scotland.

"Definitely the last 16 is my minimum objective, but then again it also depends on the luck of the draw sometimes. I can probably play the number one seed early, so you never know in these tournaments, but the main aim is of course to get to the Round of 16," Henry said.

"It was a very good run in Delhi, it gave me confidence knowing that I can compete against the Asians and Europeans to actually reach that far so my confidence is really high going into this Commonwealth Games," added Henry

"It would definitely give us more coverage and support from the private sector who would see that we have a growing sport. We have the Junior Pan Am team that is going away without any funding at all from outside sources, it's the parents who had to put money together and they are a really good team, so it's a shame," Henry lamented. "So hopefully our achievement will bring badminton to the forefront."

The 22 year-old has spent much of the last few days working with the other members of the team in a specialised high intensity training programme, which Henry believes will also help in realising his ambitions.

"It's been mainly technical work, physically I am in good shape, so we just needed to brush up on the execution of the shots, playing smarter shots, moving the opponent around the board before we can take the kill and go for the big winners so it was mostly technical and mental work," Henry said.

The badminton competition gets under way on July 24.