12 Dec 2016
Zurich, 12 December 2016. Five athletes of Aspire Academy's squash program competing in this year’s Swiss Junior Open that took place in Zurich from December 8 to 11. The Swiss tournament is a European Junior Super Series event and attracts the best European and UK players each year.
The highest finishing position of the group came from Waleed Zaman who placed 9th in the Under 15 event. This was a good achievement from Waleed who in the process beat the European number 6 ranked player whom he lost to in the Hungarian Junior tournament recently. As well as this he managed to turn the tables on English player Jack Bloomfield, who likewise he was beaten by earlier this year, winning his final match of the tournament 3-0. Also in the Under 15 event, after defeats in the main draw, both Abdulaziz Al-Ishaq and Rashid Al-Harib won through to their final playoff match in which they would play against each other. Abdulaziz narrowly edged out his team mate on this occasion 11-9 in the deciding game to take 17th position.
Hamad Al-Amri eventually took 12th place in the Under 17 category after going down in a close 4 games to the number 3 seed Scott Gillanders of Ireland in the round of 16. Though unforced errors cost him at times in this match Hamad demonstrated some excellent passages of play in this and each of his matches throughout the event. If he can begin to apply this type of game more consistently, he looks the equal of many top juniors of his age. Elsewhere Ali Al-Dosari managed to win 1 of his 4 matches in the Under 17 event with a 3-0 win in his final match.
Full draws and results for the event can be found on the tournament website link: http://swissjunioropen.ch/