I'm live and running in Berjaya Times Square and awaiting the 1st match. Scores are now live courtesy of
Squashstars.
Below are the full results:
Men
Ramy Ashour beat Amir Atlas Khan 12/14, 11/3, 11/6, 11/6
Ong Beng Hee beat El Shorbagy 7/11, 8/11, 16/14, 11/4, 11/8
Azlan Iskandar beat Stewart Boswell 11/1, 11/8, 11/5
Karim Darwish beat Cameron Pilley 11/7, 11/7, 11/9
Women
Nicol David beat Kasey Brown 12/10, 14/12, 11/1
Alison Waters beat Samantha Teran 11/5, 11/2, 8/11, 11/13, 12/10
Omneya Abdel Kawy beat Madeline Perry 12/10, 7/11, 11/5, 11/7
Jenny Duncalf beat Laura Massaro 11/7, 4/11, 10/12, 10/11 retired due to injury
It was an amazing day having 8 matches on the glass court one after another. And every match had some sort of drama or thrilling moments. Darwish and Pilley were on 1st and it was fast paced. Darwish showed why he was a former World Champion and world no. 1 when he clinically finished every good chance he had.
Jenny and Laura played 2nd with Laura having match ball but collided with Jenny and in the process twisted her ankle to concede the match. What wretched luck and according to the doctor that had the first look, she may be out for 4 weeks.
Azlan then took on Boswell and Azlan was on fire. He was very quick out of the blocks and attacked everything that was short and Boswell had practically no answer except the middle part of the 2nd game where he slowed the pace down a little and sucked Azlan into it. But Azlan stepped up and closed it.
Kawy vs Perry was either winners or errors from both players in the first 2 games. Kawy then showed what great hands she has to just keep hitting winner after winner. Perry tried her best but always looked 2nd best here.
Beng Hee and Shorbagy was the longest match of the day and I was nail biting especially when Shorbagy took the 1st easily due to Beng Hee being very loose and reckless. But he tighten up and led the 2nd 8-4 but then lost 7 points in a row to lose it. The 3rd was the same as teh 2nd where Beng Hee built a lead and almost lost it. He somehow managed to squeezed it at the end. After that he was always in front and duly created an upset he deserved.
Waters was 2-0 up against Teran in like 10-12 minutes and we were expecting a very quick one. Teran was full of nerves and it showed. After managing to composed herself, she then managed to put Waters under pressure and was unlucky to lose 12/10 in the 5th.
Ramy and Amir was something of a repeat of their junior days. Amir got off to a great start while Ramy looked sluggish and duly lost that 14/12. He then showed why he's the best player in the world at the moment by stepping up a gear and was 9-0 up before Amir got his 1st point. Ramy the repeated it in the next 2 to wrap it up in about 30 mins. Ramy has incredible speed, great accuracy on the drops and can create shots out of nothing.
Everyone thought Nicol would walk all over Kasey but it wasn't. Kasey gave a performance that suggest that she may trouble our queen in the near future if she is able to continue the progress. Kasey just was out of air and a little dejected for not being able to close out the first 2 games.
