Upsets at Christchurch International Open

An exciting night of squash from the Burnside Squash Club with local favourite Paul Coll, the top seed on first against James Huang of Chinese Taipei.  Coll was slow to start and made a couple of early mistakes to be down 4/1 in the first.  However he soon established a good length and forced mistakes from his opponent to make up the deficit.  He continued to force the pace, taking the ball very early and closed out the first game comfortably at 11/6.  The next two games were similar, Coll pushing his opponent all around the court and then finishing off with some deft winners, and the 3 game match was over quite quickly, Coll comfortably through to the semis.

The next match between Josh Larkin of Australia and Peter Creed of Wales, the 4th seed was a complete contrast to the first match and was tense right through the 84 minute five-setter.  The first two games were close but the Welshman seemed to be in control and took a 2/0 lead, maybe this was to be another 3/0 win?  Not so, the Australian Larkin fought back brilliantly and there were some moments of high drama and tension in the next 2 games and some very acrobatic efforts by Creed as he attempted to retrieve shots from all over the court.  It was destined for a 5th set finale with Creed taking an upper hand as the Australian Larkin made a couple of unforced errors.  It went close but Creed always seemed to be just ahead and closed out the final game 11/7 … a fantastic match to watch.

Angus Gillams the English 3rd seed started off strongly in his first game and had the better of Kiwi opponent Lance Beddoes who made a few errors and was always a bit behind, he lost the first 11/8.  However Beddoes came out firing in the 2nd, hit some great winners and took a surprising 7-0 lead, but this was not to last for long.  The Englishman fought back to close the gap and take it into a long tiebreak, the lead changed hands a number of times before Beddoes finally took the game 17/15 to tie the match up and 1/1.  The next two games however were decisive, left-handed Gillams took control of the match with some great drops and tight drives particularly on his forehand, Beddoes had no real answers and the match finished quite quickly 11/2, 11/2 after the marathon 2nd set.

The final match was great to watch with the powerful attacking Englishman Josh Masters playing the 2nd seeded Malaysian Ivan Yuen.  The first game went close with Masters taking it narrowly.  Yuen fought back in the 2nd and seemed to take control of the match taking it 11/6 with Masters making a number of errors in his effort to hit winners.  However Masters came out firing and hit some amazingly clean winners when given the opportunity in the 3rd, it was close again but Masters just got there 11/9.  Masters seemed to take confidence from this and built a good lead in the 4th, at 10/4 it was always going to be a tough task for the Malaysian to fight back and so it proved, Masters taking the final point with a stroke at the front of the court.  A bit of an upset there and the bottom half of the draw now fairly open.

You can watch the excitement from 4:30pm tonight here and some round 1 games here

If you want some alternative commentary check out the SPALK page here

Draws for the PSA event can be found here whilst the local event and local draws can be found here

Check out the writeups from Qualifying Round 1, Qualifying Round 2  and Round 1 as well.

Quarter Finals

Paul Coll (NZL) (1) beat James Huang (TPE) (8) 11/6, 11/4, 11/5 (37 mins)

Peter Creed (WAL) (4) beat Joshua Larkin (AUS) (6) 11/9, 11/9, 8/11, 9/11, 11/7 (84 mins) 

Angus Gillams (ENG) (3) beat Lance Beddoes (NZL) (8) 11/8, 15/17, 11/2, 11/2 (45 mins) 

Joshua Masters (ENG) (5) beat Ivan Yuen (MAS) (2) 11/9, 6/11, 11/9, 11/6 (46 mins)

Semi Finals

4:30pm Paul Coll (NZL) (1) vs Peter Creed (WAL) (4)

5:30pm Angus Gillams (ENG) (3) vs Josh Masters (ENG) (5)