Thatcher on Thursday
Alan Thatcher's regular comment on the World of Squash  

Thatcher on Thursday
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ToT History Page

12th August 2010
CLOUGHIE: TOP MANAGER AND TOP BLOCKER!
29th July 2010
SYLVAN JOINS THE REDS
24th June 2010
WIN A HIT WITH NICK MATTHEW
27th May 2010
WILLSTROP’S TRIBUTE TO WORLD NUMBER ONE
24th May
Nick Matthew
1st April
JONAH BACK ON COURT
19th March
CANARY WHARF CLASSIC IS A SELL-OUT
4th February
JOHN DALE Tribute
14th January 2010
HAPPY NEW YEAR
 

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12th August 2010

CLOUGHIE: TOP MANAGER AND TOP BLOCKER!

Former Nottingham Forest striker Garry Birtles gives a vivid insight into the often unfathomable mind of football manager Brian Clough in his weekly column for the Nottingham Post.
Clough knew that all sporting combat is eventually solved by individual strengths and weaknesses, and he was a pioneer of what we now call mind games.  In his column, Birtles admits that being Clough’s regular squash partner was something of a poisoned chalice. And he also reveals that the wily old fox was something of an expert blocker in the middle of the squash court. Birtles writes:


I am a shocking loser. Just ask my old squash partners at Chilwell Olympia. I used to play there every Thursday afternoon when I was at Forest.

You can't even go for a stroll for a carton of milk 48 hours before a game these days without asking permission of the fitness trainer and the manager.

The Gaffer loved squash though and it was never a problem in those days.

I was a pretty good squash player. I thought about taking it up before football and I must have been half decent because the Gaffer had me play with him at Trent Bridge squash club on a regular basis.

But I lost count of the number of racquets I smashed up in anger on the back wall because I had lost a poxy game of squash to a mate! But that was the way I had been brought up. The Gaffer always drilled it into us that if you are 3-0 up, go 4-0 up and 5-0 up. Never let up. Never take the foot off the pedal. That is a weakness. Destroy them, grind them into the dirt.

Once the gaffer discovered I played squash, that was it. He had me earmarked as his new playing partner and that might sound a privilege, but let me assure you, it was not.

The way it would work was fairly simple. He would let me go down to training and complete virtually the whole session and then, as regular as clockwork, ten minutes before everyone was allowed to pack up for the day and return to the ground, an apprentice would come jogging over in my direction and utter the immortal words 'you're playing squash with the Gaffer in ten minutes'.

I used to have to sprint back up the banks of the Trent and get back to the dressing rooms in double-quick time.

The best I could hope for was to rub most of the mud off my legs and filthy training kit, before grabbing my squash gear and shifting my backside to the front of the ground where the Mercedes would be running and he would be looking at his watch.

He would drive us over there and we would be straight on the court, which was where the fun began!

Despite always complaining about having a dodgy knee, he was a bloody good sportsman and loved squash and tennis, but I was better than him.

He knew it and I knew it, but I don't think I ever won a game! It was not that I was some pathetic brown-nose who let him win in the vain hope that might curry favour and get me in the first team. He was a terrible cheat and hated losing.

Whenever I was attempting to manoeuvre myself towards the T and into the optimum position to make my next shot, I would somehow bump into this immovable object that went by the name of Clough.

Or he would play his shot and accidently set up a personal road block on the exact route I needed to take to continue the rally. 'Would you like that point again son?' was his usual response when that occurred.

There was no such thing as a let when he was playing squash. Effectively I was left apologising for running into his racquet with my teeth and the point was his!

It was a ritual humiliation I endured for an hour a couple of times a week. We had some great games and battles, but whenever it got to key points, or tight, I knew the offer of replaying the point was never far away.

Cheating? He would have called it gamesmanship and he hated losing, especially to a carpet fitter.

Source: www.thisisnottingham.co.uk



HARVARD TO LEARN MIKE’S WAY

Mike Way has been named director of the men’s and women’s squash squads at Harvard. Way has coached a number of leading professionals on the PSA and WISPA tours, including former world champions Jonathon Power of Canada and Sarah Fitzgerald of Australia.

Way has said he is looking forward to becoming part of college squash. A Harvard press release Way says: “I am delighted and honored to have been offered the position of director of squash at Harvard. I have coached a number of young men and women over the years who have gone on to compete at the varsity level.  This opportunity will enable me to be an important part of their further development. I am also excited to be part of the broader and dynamic community that makes up the college squash scene.”

Way, who most recently served as the head squash coach at the National Squash Training Centre in Canada, helped create the training center and was an integral figure in developing over 50 world and national champions, All-Americans and junior national champions.  Way has been the primary coach from the U13 category to some of the most successful U.S. college players over the last 10 years, including Harvard’s Laura Gemmell, the 2010 CSA national champion and Ivy League Player and Rookie of the Year.  Way also worked since 2003 as the head squash professional at The Oakville Club, where he was directly responsible for all aspects of the program, leagues, tournaments, clinics, exhibitions and coaching.

Way will take the reins of the Harvard squash program after the controversial dismissal of Satinder Bajwa in April. Last season, the women’s team won the Howe Cup—the team national championship—but the men’s team, which took second place nationally at the start of Bajwa’s tenure, placed fifth for the second straight year.

At the time, athletic director Robert Scalise said in a press release that the athletic department “decided to go in a different direction with the leadership of the program.”

A man who has led several players to worldwide prestige, Way’s most notable success was the career of Power, who clinched the No. 1 spot in the Professional Squash Association’s world rankings in May 1999 and held that rank for 14 months during his career. Power retired from professional squash in March 2006 after reclaiming the first-place spot from Australian David Palmer, though he still played for the Canadian national team at the World Team Championships in 2007 and 2009.

Way has also coached other noteworthy players, including Graham Ryding, a three-time Canadian squash champion, and Shahier Razik, who won the most recent Canadian squash championship—his fourth—after Power withdrew due to a leg injury.

But though Way has never headed a collegiate team before, he does have experience coaching younger players, including rising Harvard sophomore Laura Gemmell, who posted a 16-0 overall record at No. 1 on the women’s team last season en route to an individual national championship. Working with junior squash players, Way said, enables him to participate in a “broad spectrum of coaching” and illustrate to players that as young adults, their abilities can still improve.

“I want us—and I know it sounds like a cliché—but when I tell them I really want them to enjoy the program, I mean it,” he said. “I really want to show them they can still develop as players.”

Way said that finding assistant coaches will be among his top priorities when he arrives in Cambridge, but rather than radically changing the existing program, he said that fundamentally, he’ll be doing what any other coach would do—“working very hard and very smart”—though he does offer his players this piece of advice.

“Get ready—and I mean that with an exclamation mark.”

Sources: College Squash Association (www.collegesquashassociation.com) and Harvard Crimson (www.harvard.edu)

29th July 2010

SYLVAN JOINS THE REDS

Sylvan Richardson is a familiar and popular figure around the squash circuit, treating a succession of tired bodies during major tournaments.

The former Simply Red musician traded in the fame game with Mick Hucknall to learn a new career as a physiotherapist.

News of his success obviously travelled far beyond the world of squash and this week he was announced as the new masseur to Liverpool FC.

He joined the Anfield club for pre-season training in Switzerland and told BBC Liverpool: "They have been giving me a lot of stick, especially assistant manager Sammy Lee."

No doubt Sylvan will be looking forward to Liverpool’s fixture on September 19, when he might well be meeting up at Old Trafford with his former Simply Red band-mate Hucknall, who is a keen supporter of Liverpool's main rivals, Manchester United.

Richardson was kept extremely busy by the walking wounded during the ISS Canary Wharf Classic in March, with champion Nick Matthew thanking him during his victory speech for the two-hour treatment he received from Sylvan after his brutal semi-final victory over James Willstrop, which lasted a similar length of time.

Now he will be charged with helping to keep some of the most expensive athletes on the planet in prime condition in the treament rooms at Anfield and the Melwood training ground.

TANIA READY FOR GAMES

Tania Bailey is a real inspiration to anyone struggling to overcome illness or injury. For years she has been fighting the effects of a debilitating virus infection and, more recently, a knee injury.

Her determination has been rewarded with a place in England’s Commonwealth Games squad heading for Delhi in October.

Bailey, 30, won a silver medal in the women's doubles at the 2002 Games, and bronze in the same event in 2006.

She has slipped down the world rankings following a serious knee injury.

But she told BBC Lincolnshire: "It was a goal of mine but it looked a long way off over the last two years, but the team selectors have kept faith in me."

Bailey, who was a beaten quarter-finalist in the women's singles in 2002 and 2006, added: "Having played in two previous Commonwealth Games, my experience probably helped with their decision."

England squad - men: Nick Matthew, James Willstrop, Peter Barker, Daryl Selby, Adrian Grant.

Women: Jenny Duncalf, Alison Waters, Laura Massaro, Sarah Kippax, Tania Bailey.

HOTELS IDEAL FOR COURTING COUPLES

I am always on the look-out for special hotels that include squash among the facilities on offer to guests. I can now happily add another venue to the list.

The Avisford Park Hilton Hotel, situated on the A27 between Arundel and Chichester in glorious West Sussex, possesses an 18-hole golf course, two squash courts and a delightful outdoor swimming pool. Your humble correspondent and his long-suffering wife celebrated their 30th wedding anniversary last weekend and Avisford Park was an ideal location.

As you might imagine, the idea was to get as far away from squash business as possible and I was banned from stowing the squash rackets in the boot.

However, I look forward to another visit when I might be able to squeeze in a game or two.

Other favourite haunts with courts on-site include the Racquet Club Hotel, Liverpool, and the White Oaks resort at Niagara-on-the-Lake in Canada. Ideal for courting couples.

WIN A HIT WITH NICK MATTHEW

Here’s a great challenge for any aspiring junior squash player: the chance to get on court with world No.1 Nick Matthew!

In the coming weeks he is going to be fronting a squash challenge with the new Talent Nation website (www.talentnation.com), encouraging youngsters to film them trying to hit as many “figure of eight” shots in a minute. The winner will get to spend a training session with Nick.

Talent Nation is a brilliant new website created for genuine sports enthusiasts.

Squash is among 128 sports with its own channel. Users are invited to create their own Locker (like a profile), to upload videos and photos of their sporting achievements, to safely interact with other users and stars, and to share comments and tips on their sports. 

Unlike other social networking sites, TalentNation has employed specialist security software which ensures no inappropriate language, behaviour or contact is allowed on site.

Hook up with Nick Matthew and many other sports stars on: www.talentnation.com

KENT OPEN SUCCESS: NO RESTING ON OUR LAURELS

Work has already started on developing next year’s Kent Open and Kent Squash Festival following the success of this year’s first edition.

The professional tournament, held at The Mote Squash Club in the county town of Maidstone, was the pinnacle event of the three-month Kent Squash Festival, which introduced more than 300 school pupils to squash and racketball.

The quality of play in the PSA One Star tournament produced a week of top-class entertainment at the Mote and it was great to see spectators travelling to watch the action from all over the county.

Funding events like this is always a major undertaking and we are grateful to England Squash and Racketball for their enormous support, with further sponsorship emerging from Harrow Rackets, Kent SRA and the Shepherd Neame brewery, plus a number of generous individual donations.

The sponsorship search for 2011 has already begun and a number of solid pledges are already in place.

It was wonderful to see the PSA players willingly giving up time in the afternoons to help coach school children during the daily clinics at The Mote and we look forward to seeing a significant growth in the number of junior members at squash clubs throughout the county as a result of this initiative.

Our major targets for the Open and the Festival were to raise the profile of the sport through an ongoing publicity campaign and to attract new players to the sport. We would like to think we achieved both targets but there is no resting on our laurels.

Our ambition is to reach every school in the county over the next few years to attract new players and provide a much larger playing base for our sport.

I was interested to learn from one of our Egyptian visitors that his home club in Cairo has around 180 junior members.

That kind of programme is bound to create the kind of competitive atmosphere responsible for the recent surge in Egyptian squash at all levels.

Those numbers will also sustain a team of full-time coaches, and increasing the number of qualified coaches in the county has to be another of our priorities as we look to build on this year’s success.

For English squash to compete with the likes of Egypt, we need to build our junior participant base as quickly as possible.
 

27th May 2010
WILLSTROP’S TRIBUTE TO WORLD NUMBER ONE MATTHEW

James Willstrop and Nick Matthew enjoy a phenomenal rivalry on court. Much has been made of Willstrop’s reaction to his defeat by Matthew in last year’s British Open final. But any thoughts of possible friction between the two players were clearly dispelled at the climax of their phenomenal two-hour battle in the semi-final of the ISS Canary Wharf Classic.

Willstrop’s challenge in that match was ended by injury, a freak fall causing a painful spasm of cramp that completely immobilised the 6ft 5in Pontefract player.

Matthew’s response, one of obvious concern for Willstrop’s well-being, and his refusal to accept an instant victory as he insisted on his opponent being given more time to recover after the referee had gone on court to award him the match, clearly illustrated the enormous respect both men have for each other, as did the hug in mid-court when Willstrop was finally able to stand up and concede defeat.

That respect was echoed this week in Willstrop’s column in the Yorkshire Evening Post as Matthew celebrated his elevation to number one in the world rankings.

Willstrop’s commentary provided a clear insight into the stress that Matthew had to overcome to beat Thierry Lincou in his semi-final of the Sky Open to collect the ranking points necessary to overtake Ramy Ashour at the top of the rankings.
Here’s what Willstrop wrote:

It has been a week that those involved in squash in England will remember for a very long time. England has a new world number one in squash in Nick Matthew.
There are very few English sportsmen and women who are the very best, so we have a major story on our hands.

Nick has stood at world number two behind Ramy Ashour, who had one of his whimsical weeks in his hometown, Cairo, when he lost to Karim Darwish comfortably in the semi-finals of the Sky Open, since January.

Karim's victory over his fellow countryman was a decidedly frustrating match for me personally to observe, seeing as though 24 hours previously Ramy played as a different being, ending any hopes I had in three games.

However, Ramy's flying off of the handle against Karim paved the way, quite nicely, for Nick to achieve his dream, though it was utterly tantalising.

Nick had watched Ramy's defeat as he prepared for his match and I might suggest that it was a good thing Nick was on immediately afterwards, so he had little time to consider the precipice on which he stood.

After all the trials and tribulations over all the years, it came down to one match; he had to beat Thierry Lincou on Friday night to gain enough ranking points to hit number one; the calculations were done after Ramy's match. He knew exactly what needed to be done.

Thierry is a player of vast, vast experience. He has been world number one and world champion, and he is immensely tough to beat. On any other day, and especially considering the form Nick has produced of late, he would have been a definite favourite, but this was not just another match.

Nick said afterwards he finally knew what it was like to play with a 'glass arm', and declared that it was probably the toughest match of his life. He may not have meant this in a tactical or physical respect, but rather in terms of what was at stake for him.

It wasn't just the match he had to think about, but the threat of injury too. One ankle roll and the dream ends. In a situation such as this it is probably best not to think, so as not to realise the enormity of the occasion.

Nick not only completed the win against Lincou, but he also held out and reproduced again to beat Darwish in four games on Saturday to win the tournament.

Going to bed on Friday knowing that he had achieved the ultimate but still had another match to play must surely have been a tortuous counter-punching of feelings for his head to deal with, but the job was completed. England's squash fraternity has cause to celebrate.

Let's hope the rest of the country's sporting fraternity joins in, as this sort of achievement doesn't happen every day.

By ALAN THATCHER

Nick Matthew has finally made it to number one in the PSA world rankings and a chorus of congratulations is echoing round the squash community.

He finally overtook Ramy Ashour after the Egyptian was knocked out in the semi-finals of the Sky Open in Cairo by Karim Darwish, whom Matthew overcame in the final.

At 29, Matthew has left it slightly late in his career to hit the top. But that’s an irrelevance. His achievement is a phenomenal one in an era of strong competition at the top of the rankings where any one of half a dozen players is capable of winning major tournaments these days.

Alongside Matthew, Ashour and Darwish, Amr Shabana, James Willstrop and Gregory Gaultier make up the Super Six.

Right now Matthew will be savouring this moment and reflecting on the tremendous strides he has made in the past year since returning from a shoulder injury that kept him off court for many months.

He has added a ruthless efficiency to his high-paced, attacking game and will be keen to extend his career, and his period at the top of the rankings, for as long as he can.

He is generous to acknowledge the help and support he has received from family, friends and a variety of support systems down the years.

A more recent development has been his involvement with the English Institute of Sport in his home city of Sheffield, where he has worked alongside athletes from a variety of disciplines and learned how to cope with the frustrations of dealing with a long-term injury, and absorbed the knowledge necessary to programme his recovery.

Like James Willstrop, he has emerged a better player after returning from injury. 

Both players have returned to the competitive arena following these setbacks as more hardened professionals, learning how to strengthen both mind and body in the process.

For Matthew, the return to top form after a back injury has given him a new perspective on life.

He said: “I’m feeling good right now and I have learnt throughout my career that when you have a good win you can’t stay on that high for too long. There is a gap between tournaments when you come down and at some point you have to get yourself up for the next one. Sometimes, if events are back to back that doesn’t happen until the middle of the next tournament!”

I enjoyed a long chat with Matthew ahead of the recent ISS Canary Wharf Classic, and he is clearly chalking off a lot of ambitions this year. His first Canary Wharf followed, beating Gaultier in fairly straightforward fashion after his brutal two-hour semi-final battle with Willstrop.

After a well-earned summer rest he will be aiming to get himself fired up for the Commonwealth Games in Delhi.

He said: “Getting up for tournaments, I am grateful to have such a fantastic team behind me, starting with national coach David Pearson who has been at my side for so long. I am also indebted to Mark Campbell, my physio, and Mark Bawden, a psychologist based at the English Institute of Sport in Sheffield. I am now working with him on a more regular basis.

“I want to thank them for giving me all the help they can. Ultimately it’s all down to me but the EIS has been a massive part of my life. There are athletes there from all walks of life. Jessica Ennis, the heptathlete from Sheffield, is a leading light and a good friend.

“It’s great to be part of it all and you can’t help but learn from all the different influences that are available. You absorb things from other sports and it is so nice not to exist purely in a squash bubble.

“You are always watching other athletes in action, and watching how they prepare for events. It is great to be part of it and to see how they handle the different stresses that arise in all the different disciplines, and especially those sports that attract more publicity than we do.

“Normally squash players just exist in a squash community but being part of this kind of sporting community leads to good habits.”

Matthew has certainly taken those habits with him on court in recent months as he has added tournament triumphs in Qatar, Sweden, Virginia, Canary Wharf and now the Sky Open to his tally of two British Open victories and another national title in Manchester.

The threatening cluster of so many powerful Egyptians around the top of the rankings is a constant presence but not something Matthew chooses to worry about.

He said: “This is not a conscious rivalry that we think about all the time. You just have to take each match one at a time and try to beat whoever you are drawn against, wherever they are from.

“This is a very good time for English squash. We have lot of players who are now approaching their peak years, and they can’t be called promising players any more. They are right at their peaks and delivering some excellent results. This is a very prosperous time for English squash as a whole, with tremendous strength in depth in both the men’s and women’s games.

“It would be nice to leave a legacy to the next generation coming through and hopefully they can learn from us and carry the torch at the top after we have gone. I don’t see that happening at the moment but there are players around like Jon Kemp, who has yet to hit his peak, so a lot of things can happen in the next few years to prove everyone wrong about the next generation. 

“A lot is made of the Egyptian thing and rightly so, but as players you have got to do it for yourselves. So, yes, they are exciting to watch but it’s not something we think about all the time.

“You simply have to beat the next guy in front of you wherever you are playing and wherever they are from.”

Matthew admits that he has learned a lot from two experienced campaigners, Frenchman Thierry Lincou and Australia’s David Palmer.

Both are still playing superb squash well into their 30s and I asked Matthew, who is 30 in July, if he had a similar long-term plan.

He said: “Me? A five-year plan? I don’t have a five-minute plan! Five hours is about as far as I go these days!”

1st April
JONAH BACK ON COURT AS DUNLOP TEAM UP WITH ESR

Squash legend Jonah Barrington took to the court again at Canary Wharf when England Squash and Racketball announced a five-year sponsorship agreement with Dunlop.

Jonah played an exhibition match with his son Joey and, thanks to some creative officiating from Tournament Referee Linda Davie and myself, somehow squeezed home 12-10 in a tiebreak.

“That is the first tiebreak I have ever played in my whole life,” said Jonah. “And hopefully it will be the last.”

In a deal worth in excess of £500,000, Dunlop have become the Official Development Partner to ESR and will become the lead sponsor of several high-profile events including the Premier Squash League, the National Racketball Championships and the Mini Squash Programme.

Dunlop have enjoyed a long relationship with Jonah ever since they persuaded him to give up his old Grays Light Blue for a wooden Maxply, and he has been an ever-present Dunlop figure in a constantly changing world as racket designs and shapes have evolved in keeping with the technological strides being made in all areas of the game.

Jonah was the driving force behind the launch of a professional world tour and the introduction of glass courts has allowed the PSA and WISPA to develop the ideas he formulated some 40 years ago.

It was a treat to see Jonah in action again, with Joey using one of his dad’s old wooden rackets and Jonah using one of Joey’s modern weapons.

The 68-year-old Jonah clearly enjoyed the rules of combat, which meant that Joey had to strike all of his shots to the back of the court and Jonah could hit the ball anywhere he liked. This resulted in a lot of sliced drops to the front of the court which had Joey scrambling to keep the ball in play.

Before the match, Jonah could be seen stretching and ghosting in the Canary Wharf corridors outside the East Wintergarden, bringing back so many visions of his phenomenal training workload down the years which either inspired or frightened off  opponents or the generations of younger players subsequently sent to him to acquire a squash education.

Towards the end of their one-game challenge, Jonah was clearly warming up, moving smoothly and happy to rally up and down the walls.

At the end of the game, I couldn’t resist joking with him that after 50 years he had finally realized that he was a touch player after all and that if he hadn’t wasted all that energy in two-hour battles with Geoff Hunt he could still be playing on the PSA Tour.

Jonah’s comments throughout the match clearly unnerved referee Linda and as the tears of laughter rolled down her cheeks I was happy to take the microphone and try to restore some semblance of order. But up against a master wordsmith like Jonah there was only ever going to be one winner!

Later in the evening Jonah was looking forward to commentating with his son on the semi-finals and said: “We can never have a conversation for more than a minute, or maybe a minute and a half, without arguing so it will be interesting to see how things go.”

Joey countered: “This time it’s my job to try to keep him under control for once.”

The audience at Canary Wharf enjoyed it enormously and they were delighted to cheer Alison Waters to victory in her racketball challenge that followed against Jonathon Kemp.

Kempy may have climbed into the world top 20 but he clearly needs to brush up on his racketball skills!

SQUASH IS A TOP SIX SPORT AND DON’T FORGET IT

Before the exhibition, I was pleased to welcome Nick Rider, chief executive of England Squash and Racketball, who explained the details of the hugely encouraging tie-up with Dunlop.

Nick was keen to point out that squash is rated a top-six sport in England, meaning that we have more active players than sports such as tennis, rugby and hockey.

Nick said: “Squash is one of the few sports where England has genuine world class talent with four men and three women ranked in the top 10 in the world. We want to continue this tradition which is why the partnership with Dunlop will help increase resources at a grass roots level to make the sport more accessible to all.

“One of our strategic aims over the next five years is to introduce 122,000 children to squash and racketball and this partnership will help us achieve that. The announcement of the partnership is an important milestone for us as we have been working with Oaks Consultancy in restructuring our sponsorship offering in order to create more value to sponsors and revenues for the sport.”

Dunlop already sponsors elite players such as Egypt’s Amr Shabana and England’s world No.2 Nick Matthew, who beat France’s Gregory Gaultier in an all-Dunlop final on Friday.

How’s that for a sponsor’s dream?

BIG-HITTER DECLAN

Nick Matthew couldn’t resist going on court for a quick hit during the Dunlop Radar Gun Challenge, but his top speed of 147mph (and Jon Kemp’s 148mph) was soundly beaten by Declan James from Nottingham, who struck the ball at 158mph.
 

19th March
ISS CANARY WHARF CLASSIC IS A SELL-OUT SUCCESS

The ISS Canary Wharf Classic is a total sell-out. Every seat for every session, from Monday to Friday, has been sold in advance. I'm pretty sure this is a first for a major PSA ranking tournament.

Even in the good old days of the British Open selling out all 3,000 tickets for the finals at Wembley Conference Centre, there were always hundreds of empty seats during the early rounds.

Fellow promoters Peter Nicol and Tim Garner are naturally delighted. Peter said: "It's a first for us in our seventh year of competition and I'm pretty sure it's a first anywhere in squash."

He added: "It's a sign of the quality of the squash on show, the fantastic atmosphere in the magnificent East Winteregarden venue and the culmination of seven years' hard work by the organising team. I can't wait for the first game on Monday."

RICHARDS IN FOR KHAN

An already strong English presence in the tournament has been increased by the inclusion of rising star Tom Richards. The world No.33 from Guildford, Surrey, goes into the main draw to replace Aamir Atlas Khan. The world No.20 from Pakistan withdrew because of an injury sustained in the Malaysian Open this week.

POWER PLAY AT CANARY WHARF

Jonathon Power will be putting in an appearance at Canary Wharf. More news on Monday - watch this space!

 I first met John Dale when he travelled down to Kent 12 years ago to play in the Maidstone Open and the European Squash Festival in Folkestone. He won both tournaments and made a lot of friends along the way.

John and I kept in touch and it was like a bolt from the blue when he revealed he was suffering from a brain tumour.

John’s friends swung into action and I was pleased to help out with a number of fund-raising activities in his honour, including a fabulous evening at Chichester and two events in a single day in Newcastle, first of all at the Northumberland Club in Jesmond and then at a packed-out Tynemouth in the evening.

Peter Genever senior travelled up from the South Coast to announce that John would be retained in their National League squad whatever his condition.

World champion Peter Nicol willingly supported all three events along with a number of other professionals, clearly illustrating how the squash community rallied round to help such a popular guy on and off the court.

When I visited John with Steve Cubbins he had only just been allowed home after he had contracted a life-threatening infection in hospital.

Amazingly, John recovered steadily and although he was unable to return to the professional tournament scene he was destined to carve out a successful career as a coach.

He was delighted to land a job in the States, but, tragically, the cancer appeared again and John was forced to return home to Tyneside. At least he was closer to his beloved Newcastle United.

I spoke to him on the phone a few weeks ago and he was typically upbeat about fighting the dreaded disease all over again.

Tragically, this time the cancer was not to be beaten and we all lost a great Geordie mate at such a young age.

God Bless You, John. We’ll all miss you.
 

14th January

HAPPY NEW YEAR

Let’s start the new decade by wishing a Happy New Year to all of our readers worldwide. Let’s hope 2010 brings a non-stop wave of enjoyment on court, harmony between players and referees, dynamic leadership from our governing bodies, and a clear-headed vision of where the sport wants to be as we continue to pursue the dream of squash becoming an Olympic sport.

PJ BACK ON COURT

It was great to see Paul Johnson back in action in Kent last week. The former world No.4 turned out for Bromley Cricket Club in the North West Kent Priory League match against his old mate James Robbins, from Park Langley.

PJ, who is coaching in America, was back in Bromley for the Christmas holidays. He looked very sharp as he won the opening two games at a canter but his old county team-mate hit back to take the match to five.

PJ then regained his earlier composure to clinch a 9-0, 9-4, 6-9, 2-9, 9-5 victory which helped Bromley CC to an important 3-2 win over their Park Langley hosts, who are second in the table behind Tim Garner’s Dulwich all-stars!

EGYPT RULES THE ROOST

Not only did Egypt dominate the British Junior Open in Sheffield once again, they extended their mastery by winning all eight titles at under-13, under-15, under-17 and under-19 level.

Mohamed El Shorbagy led the way with his third under-19 Drysdale Cup success and his younger brother Marwan clinched the under-17 championship. And Nour El Shorbini showed what an amazing prospect she is by winning the girls’ under-19 final at the tender age of 14.

Both finals were all Egyptian affairs, as were three others, as the 40-strong Egyptian squad raised the bar in junior squash yet again.

Everybody wants to know the Egyptians’ secret. The answer is simple: numbers, with lots of great coaches and loads of kids filling the courts after school every day.

They seem to have a system that allows talented children to rise rapidly through the ranks and not be trapped in the uniformity of the European age-group systems.

The Egyptians have dazzling hotbeds of squash in Cairo and Alexandria and they are clearly able to concentrate most of their competition in those two cities. In England, our juniors (and their parents) are subjected to a relentless slog around the country to collect random ranking points, with parents often choosing to select that route before their children have mastered the basic disciplines required in shot-making, movement and tactics.

That system, by design, will always discriminate against the juniors who choose not to enter so many tournaments but are more gifted than those who do.

A lot of our kids spend more time on the motorway than they do on court, and it’s wearing them out. Some of the time it’s not just travelling to tournaments, it’s the process of finding another junior player to train with or play against because they might be the only boy or girl in their club of county standard.

Clearly, we need more work at grass-roots level to produce a dramatic rise in junior participation levels. We need more British hotbeds like Pontefract, where juniors are inspired by the presence of players like James Willstrop and work hard to emulate his achievements.

All this brings me back to Paul Johnson, and the all-conquering Kent junior team of 20 years ago. The reason for their success? Numbers, once again.

In those days we had big clubs with massive junior sections creating the kind of competitive atmosphere that we see in Egypt.

Bromley Town had 16 courts, including a superb showcourt. That’s gone, along with most of the courts. It’s now a soulless fitness club with five courts tucked away at the back of the building.

Also gone are the Howdens Club in Beckenham (10 courts), Henwood in Ashford (10), Harveys in Maidstone (6), plus Dartford, New Eltham, Dreamland and many more.

The old Medway Squash Club has also been taken over by a fitness chain that banned juniors from the premises, including a child who was number one in the national under-13 rankings.

All of this has resulted in a dramatic reduction in the numbers of juniors playing squash, especially girls. It’s so serious that any child who picks up a racket can almost walk straight into a county squad. And I know that Kent are not alone in this.

It’s hard to fight against that kind of depressing backdrop, but rest assured those of us who are left are trying to do something about it.  

In the next few weeks I look forward to announcing a major development programme being launched in Kent alongside a new professional tournament, the Kent Open.

We might not be able to match the Egyptians at the moment, but to start with we’re trying to get the numbers up.

Watch this space.