2003: First round of Pool matches:

 
Ian McKenzie reports from Broadgate

RICKETTS WINS
'ALL-AUSSIE' MARATHON
Australia’s No.6 Seed Anthony Ricketts overcame Scotland’s John White, the No.3 Seed, in the final match of the evening to sit alongside Power at the top of the Harrow Group after day 1 of the Finals.

In a pulsating 87–minute encounter, Ricketts twice came back from a game behind to claim a 14/17, 15/12, 9/15, 15/7, 15/11 victory.

IT'S OK ... SAYS POWER
"It was OK," said Jonathon Power after seeing off a spirited challenge from Ong Beng Hee, who has looked rather jaded over the last year or so but put up a refreshingly spirited performance here.

"I lapsed in the second. I'm in good shape but perhaps a bit rusty. I've been training," Power added.

This was a pretty good performance from Power in a match disrupted by a lightning strike as the freezing weather in London broke into a thunder storm.

"Can you do something about that," said Power jokingly, but referee Jill Wood, who was given another shot at refereeing him after the tempestuous semi-final with David Palmer in 2001, had her hands full anyway. There were a number of conduct warnings one for using the F word - "Francis" - his mother's name who, according to Power, he called upon when he was in difficulties.

Referee Wood heard differently. And one for throwing his racket down the court after an attacking shot from Beng Hee that he was not going to get near.

This was a speedy encounter with a ball that was much livelier than the dead one Nicol was dealt. There were plenty of front court exchanges with Power instinctively knowing when his swishing shots had restricted his opponent's options and he moved into the gaps to narrow the distance from the ball and intercept both short and long. Power hogged the T, tried as always to recover in front of his opponent when he could, with a fair bit if interference created, and it was the unenviable task for Beng Hee to try get in front.

His was a creditable challenge but at the end Power had most of it covered. Power should improve with matches here. He looks in good shape.

NICOL COUNTERS
ON COOL COURT
Peter Nicol was comfortable enough against team-mate Lee Beachill, going ahead 15-11, 15-12 as the temperature continued to drop at the Broadgate Arena, to something near 5 degrees.

In the third however the match changed. Beachill moved better, got forward and volleyed more, and almost imperceptibly Nicol was in trouble.

"I didn't respond in the third and fourth. I tried to hit hard on a dead court," he said.

Beachill was able to stop his opponent's movement with his early swing and hold, punched balls past his static opponent, and hit his deadly volleys with more confidence to level 8-15, 5-15.

Nicol had suffered defeat to Beachill when he had been on the wrong end of runs of almost unplayable winners in the past, and that fear raced through his mind here.

"It was in my mind what he could do and how dangerous he can be," said Nicol. "I had to concentrate on getting him back."

Nicol did that at the end. He had the best of the bounce and the calls to give him the crucial edge at the start of the the fifth and persisted with his length to get his opponent back and frustrate him. In the end Beachill was tired. It was his first match back without a boot on his ankle and he is perhaps not yet at his best.

Beachill can still make the semi-finals, but he will have to beat Martin Heath on Tuesday and Thierry Lincou on Wednesday.

ERROR-PRONE LINCOU
MUST DO BETTER ...
 Thierry Lincou, the 2002 finalist, started comfortably enough to establish a 7-4 lead in the first game against the Scottish champion Martin Heath, a substitute for the absent David Palmer, but it all drifted away in error prone play for Heath to take the first game 15-10.

So often did the French champion clip the tin that it seemed to grow in stature so much that at
the end of the match one journalist slipped onto court to make a crude measurement of the tin height with his pad - longways then sideways ­ necessary, it seems, as there was not a ruler to be had in the whole square mile.

The rough assessment was that the tin height was closer to 18 than 17 inches, although from Lincou's performance it could have been a couple of feet high. The French champion kept hitting it with such frequency that Heath, the world no.15, was well in contention at one game all and 11 all.

Another couple of tins from Lincou gave Heath 13-11 but Lincou then took charge on his volley, his best attribute of the night, and ran out the game 15-12.

Five points in a hand from 1-2 to 6-2 halted Heath's challenge in the fourth and Lincou went through 10-15, 15-10, 15-13, 15-6.

Lincou will have to improve on this however is if he is to trouble Nicol and the third ranked player in his group, Lee Beachill, to earn a semi-final place.

"I wasn’t very confident today, I was a bit nervous," said Lincou. "I have to get used to the court and the atmosphere and hopefully I’ll play a lot better."

Heath was "pretty disappointed. I felt as though I was playing alright. I was leading in the third game. I’ve now got to win the next couple of matches to get through to the semis. I feel the way I’m playing I should be winning these kind of matches."
 


"Can you do something
about that?"
Jonathon Power


 Harvey congratulates Nicol

"That was hard work!
After the fourth game I just wanted to get off court and get focussed again."
Peter Nicol


 Gallery 2003

"I wasn’t very confident
 today, I was a bit nervous."
Thierry Lincou

"I feel the way I’m playing
I should be winning these
kind of matches."
Martin Heath