Siyoli Waters has claimed back-to-back titles in her home country of
South Africa after adding the WSA Tour 5 Keith Grainger Memorial UCT Squash
Open title to her haul of five.
The world No.38 was seeded first for the inaugural WSA event at Cape Town
University, where she quickly dispatched compatriots, qualifier Zoe Durbach and
No.8 seed Alexandra Fuller in similar three-game scorelines.
She then continued her run of dominance by defeating Egyptian teenager and No.4
seed Nadine Ayman Mohamed Shahin in another straight games win to confirm
her third successive WSA final.
There she faced Lauren Siddall, formerly of Yorkshire, England but now
representing South Africa, who had surprised onlookers by dispatching all three
of her seeded opposition on her way to an unfancied final.
Siddall, who held a Top40 ranking with the WSA back in 2010, beat seventh seed Julie
Lee in the opening round of the event, followed by a three game victory over
local second seed Cheyna Tucker. A third straight games win over Julia
Lecoq in the semi-final saw the Englishwoman progress to an unlikely final
appearance, her first since an Indian Challenger event in January 2010.
It was the top seed who started the contest with the most conviction, storming
to an early lead before Siddall could get a grasp on the match. Waters closed
out the first game by a comfortable margin, before setting about a similar task
in the second. Again her dominance proved unanswerable, though a few extra
points gained by the Englishwoman seemed to give her encouragement as the second
game also went in favour of Waters.
A much narrower third game ensued, with Siddall finding her range and working
out how to win points from the higher ranked player. Waters benefitted from her
early momentum and was able to close out the third by the narrowest of margins
to win the UCT Squash Open title, without dropping a game.
The South African claimed the NSA Open in Pretoria last month, and so had
claimed two back-to-back titles from three successive WSA finals, having
finished runner-up in the Central Gauteng Open in early April.
