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Tales from Toronto |
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Globe and Mail Reports
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Previews: Power & Nicol - opposites attract Power's temper chills with age |
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Power scores painful win By BEVERLEY SMITH From Friday's Globe and Mail Toronto — Canada's star squash player Jonathon Power hobbled to victory last night at the $75,000 YMG Capital Canadian Squash Classic, finally grinding out a win over his nemesis, Peter Nicol of England, who was also suffering. It seemed as if the winner of the event would be the last guy left standing. Power was steaming his way to certain victory in front of a sellout home crowd at BCE Place, before he wrenched his ankle in a freak misstep. Power, 28, who grew up in Toronto and now lives in Montreal, had to be carried off the court, but returned 35 minutes later to defeat Nicol 15-8, 15-3, 16-17 and 15-7. Now Power and Nicol are even. They've met 32 times and each has 16 wins. Last night, both were fighting painful injuries to their right ankles. That's tough for a right-handed player, such as Power. It was amazing that Nicol showed up at all. He wrenched his ankle 1½ weeks ago, was on crutches last week, but still came to Toronto. He admitted that during the second game, when Power blasted him 15-3, he was playing on only one leg. It was the battle of the walking wounded. Only three weeks before the $150,000 World Open in Antwerp, Belgium, the top two players in the world are nursing gimpy ankles. Nicol has been the world's No. 1 player for 43 months out of the past five years, with Power snatching the spot from him occasionally. Last night, Power was blasting along in the first two games, dominating Nicol, refusing to let up on him even though it was clear the Scottish-born player was troubled. Then disaster struck in the third game. Power made a lunge to return a shot, but his right foot landed on Nicol's foot, slid off sideways, and threw him off balance and seriously twisted his right ankle. Power lay writhing on the floor while Nicol and the crowd watched in stunned amazement. The Canadian player was treated on court, before he was carried off to an athletes area. Power was lucky. Dr. Peter Bletcher said the Canadian did not tear any ligaments in the ankle, and there was no internal bleeding. The ankle was solidly taped. Bletcher urged him to continue. Although Power had an hour to return to the court, he was back much sooner. "It wasn't too bad," Power said. "I was moving all right, once I got comfortable on it. The beginning was a little tough, but I didn't want to give it to him. I was playing so well today, and he didn't deserve it. And I just wanted to go for it, hard, get back out there and win the match." At every point, Power said he kept saying to himself, "Don't think about it. Don't think about it. No excuses. No excuses." Even after he returned to the court, Power spent a lot of time scrambling around on the injured ankle, slipping and sliding and ending up on his back with his feet in the air. The audience cringed every time this happened. "It's a sealed floor, so the sweat sits on the top," Power said. "Sometimes at a lunge, you'd slip." Before Power's fall, he had been keying on on Nicol's problems. "I knew he was having trouble changing directions," Power said. "That was my strategy, to flick him [from side to side] and he got tired in the fourth. He wasn't getting those cross-court shots anymore." As for Nicol, he said his injury occurred when he went over on his ankle a week ago Tuesday. "I was on crutches until Thursday afternoon, and then I flew on Friday morning." He said the organizers, who knew of his problem, helped him all they could. "I arrived at 10 on Friday evening, and I met them at the clinic at 11:30. Three of them came in to see me and gave me an hour's treatment. And that happened Friday, Saturday, Sunday and every night and day during the tournament. Without their help, I wouldn't have been able to even play, never mind getting to the final." He said he was fine on Wednesday, but "it's always difficult playing Jonathon. He's so much faster-paced than anyone else, and he moves and he twists and he turns you. And you can't play him on one leg." |
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Power
overcomes stumble By BEVERLEY SMITH From Wednesday's Globe and Mail Toronto — Jonathon Power thrives on pressure. He creates it, especially for others. He thumbs his nose at it. But last night, at the YMG Capital Canadian Squash Classic, Power was the one who was under pressure. He grimaced. He bellowed. He seemed all out of sorts. And the crowd was strangely hushed when Power lost the first game of his quarter-final, 15-11, to 30-year-old Mark Chaloner of Britain, who is ranked ninth in the world. Like an old wagon rumbling up a stony hill, Power won the next three games 15-7, 15-12 and 15-11 for victory over Chaloner, setting up a semi-final match against Joseph Kneipp of Australia tonight. But it wasn't an easy win, taking 86 minutes. Drained afterward, Power could only say initially that "it was all right. I won, so that's all that matters." Power said he felt "a little stale and flat" last night, and it was easy to tell. "I was trying to pump myself up . . . " he said, perhaps referring to a moment in the fourth game when he tossed his racquet and received a warning for his conduct. "I didn't feel like I had my normal speed and intensity, so I was maybe trying to force that intensity a little bit," Power said, adding that he felt a few lapses of concentration. "[Chaloner] was playing pretty well, moving on the ball very quickly." Once Power found his footing and his rhythm midway through the second game, he stopped being so aggressive. He turned more patient, and found opportunities better. "I think I just moved him around a little bit more, and I got him on the wrong end of a few rallies where I was in the middle [of the court] and he was doing most of the running," Power said. "Near the end of every game, he was getting tired, so I was able to get those run of points right at the end. I thought he was slowing down." Power's difficulties weren't the only surprise last night. John White, the No. 5-ranked Australian who plays for Scotland, was ousted by Kneipp, who is ranked 13th. Kneipp upset No. 6 Lee Beachill of England, earlier in the week. He had never played Beachill before. Kneipp said he hasn't played Power in three years, but defeated Power in three games during the last match. "That was a joy," Kneipp said. "I've been looking forward to playing Jonathon for ages. Unfortunately, I haven't been getting through to the late rounds." But the focus will be on Power, 28, a native of Comox, B.C., who grew up in Toronto. "I like the attention." The Canadian Classic, with $75,000 in prize money, is the tenth largest squash tournament on the Professional Squash Association tour. "Week after week, I have a lot of ups and downs," Power said. "But when the time is right to win, I'm usually pretty competitive." Power is taking aim at No. 1 Peter Nicol of Britain, who defeated him last year at this event. Th final is tomorrow at BCE Place. Power triumphed over Nicol in their first five matches earlier this season. One of them was at the Commonwealth Games in Manchester, England, where Nicol was under great pressure to win. By the time Nicol won the doubles title, he had played 14 matches in 11 days. Then he played in Hong Kong and at the U.S. Open. After 2½ months of intense competition, Nicol said he had enough. He took a vacation, and has returned at the top of his game. Power has been one of the world's best players for the past five years, often trading places with Nicol at the top, but his unpredictable behaviour on the court and his well-known jousts with referees have made him a very visible figure in squash. "Nothing is premeditated in anything I do," said Power, who has been known to lie down on the court and toss his racquet to protest a call. He lost a quarter-final match to White at the recent Qatar Open after a tussle with a referee. "I just sort of roll with how things are going, in every situation," Power said. But he said he would rather see high-level former players, rather than recreational players, become referees. "They just don't understand the game at this speed and at this level and it's very difficult to judge," Power said. "This is not like tennis, where you call the ball in or out and you just need a pair of eyes to see it. "You have to be able to anticipate and predict what is going to happen on the court. So if there is interference, you have to be able to tell that guy he's not fast enough to get to the ball. I think you really need somebody that you respect, like a peer, or an ex-player who has that knowledge . . . rather than some guy who just plays twice a week." Power said he could never be a referee. "There's not a little bit of policeman in me." |
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Nicol overruns Ryding
By BEVERLEY SMITH TORONTO -- The world's No. 1 squash player, Peter Nicol of England, knew it would be tough playing Graham Ryding of Toronto on home ground last night at the $75,000 YMG Capital Canadian Classic. Ryding pushed Nicol, making him run to the front of the court. Ryding gave a gritty, determined effort, but Nicol won 15-12, 11-15, 15-13, 15-8. In the first game, Ryding matched Nicol point for point. In the second game, Ryding was behind 9-4 but came back to win. "I felt good the first two games," Ryding said afterward. "But I lost my concentration a little bit in the third. I thought after the second game, I was really in there with a good shot to win. But he upped the pace. He played like the fast-paced Peter Nicol I know." Nicol injured an ankle about 1½ weeks ago, and in the first couple of games looked a little tentative. Ryding took advantage of it, forcing him to play at the front of the court, beating him on tricky corner shots, and shots close to the wall. Ryding said his strategy was to break up the pace, to foul up Nicol, who tends to play quickly. Ryding tried to play aggressively on some points, then slow down on others, "to take his [Nicol's] rhythm away." Two years ago, Nicol played Ryding, who is ranked No. 23 in the world, and he was hard-pressed to hold him off. Ryding won one match from him, and after 1½ hours, Nicol finally had his victory. Nicol, who has been on top of the squash world for 43 months, has had some of his most dramatic matches against Canadian star Jonathon Power. Nicol, the defending champion in the YMG Capital Classic, has the edge on the unpredictable Power, going 16-15 against him. Although Ryding is ranked No. 2 in Canada, Nicol fears him, too. "He plays a different game and has a different style from Power," Nicol said yesterday. "Graham steps forward and uses a different type of deception. Everyone says [Power] is very deceptive, but if you actually break his game down, he plays an incredible lot at the back [of the court]. He generally hits the same shots, but he just does it very well . . . Watching him, you might not agree with that, but I've played with him a lot, and you're stuck in the back corners a remarkable amount. "Graham will flick the ball a little bit more. He'll do a little bit more with the ball." Power calls Ryding one of his most fearsome opponents. He should know better than anyone, having played the Winnipeg-born Ryding since both were teenagers. "He has a very good counterattack," Power said of Ryding. "He's a dangerous player, because on his day, he can beat some of the guys in the top five in the world." The trouble is, Ryding doesn't always play at his highest level, riding a bit of a roller coaster. That's easy to do in squash, where the loss of a moment of mental focus can turn a score around completely. "His game can go really high, but he can have some bad losses also," Power said. "He's been playing really well lately." Ryding has never defeated Power as a pro player, although he defeated him several times when they were juniors. "We've had some good games . . . a couple of five gamers," Power said. "He's come close, but not yet. I hope I can hold him off. I'm sure we'll still be going at it when we're 40." Nicol is fresh off a win at the Qatar Open, where Power was defeated in a semi-final. Power returned to Canada six days ago, taking two days to get home, with a stopover in London, England. "It took a while to get over the jet lag," Power said. On Sunday night, he finally got a full night's sleep. Nicol started playing tennis at a club when he
was a youngster, but the club set up a squash court and he became
addicted. "What better?" he said. "The ball kept coming back continuously.
Tennis bored me by the sheer fact that I had to keep picking the balls up
and trying again." |
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The YMG Classic is the only major professional softball event in
Canada, but the media are gradually beginning to take an interest
in the game, largely thanks to the achievements and charisma of Jonathon
Power. Grapevine's Canadian correspondent, Ryan Barnett, emails the
following despatch: |
Power's temper |
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