El Sherbini Beats World No 1 El Welily in Weymuller Semis by Linda Elriani
photos Jean Ervasti
October 4, 2015
- Semi finals day is here at the 2015 Carol Weymuller Open. Everyone
was excited to see some more action packed squash and that’s certainly
what they got and more!!
The first semi final of today was between giant killer Joshana Chinappa
from India who is world #24 and a very on form Joelle King, former
world #4, who is doing a very impressive job of her comeback from her
Achilles injury that kept her out the game for a year. In the head to
heads Joelle is 4-1 up but they haven’t played for over a year so it
was interesting to see if things would be different this time around.
Joelle started the match in the way that every player would want to,
she was moving fluidly, taking the ball incredibly early with great
pace and keeping her opponent pinned in the back and limiting Joshana’s
chance to use her amazing short game. Joshana didn’t manage to get
herself moving the way she has been this tournament and Joelle got a
5-0 lead very quickly and even though Joshana got a sprinkling of
points, in the end she never really found her rhythm or managed to rush
or out maneuver Joelle who took the first 11/4.
The tables totally turned in the second game and Joshana came out on
court in a similar fashion to Joelle’s first game with an array of
wonderful winners and putting maximum pressure on her opponent. Her
legs now seemed charged with energy and before we knew it Joshana was
6-1 up. At 2-7 Joelle started to find her great length again and
managed to control the T more so Joshana had to work harder for the
openings. Joshana continued her run and went 10-5 up. Joelle gave a
huge push to play her own game again and Joshana started to get a
little edgy making several unforced and forced errors, and then a
perfect dying forehand drive allowed Joelle to comeback to 9-10! The
next rally was mammoth with both players covering the court so
brilliantly and finally Joshana won the rally with a kill on the
backhand, evening up the match to 1-1.
The start of the third came was even back and forth with Joshana 4-3 up
with the rallies staying fast and ferocious. Joelle suddenly went back
into the mode that she’d started the match playing very precisely and
accurately and went straight through to win the next 8 points in a row
to take the third 11/4!!
In the fourth Joelle continued her relentless barrage of tight,
accurate, powerful squash and she managed to surge forward to take an
8-3 lead. Joshana kept pushing and absorbing as much pressure from
Joelle as she could. She must have had some tiredness in her legs from
playing three very tough 3-2 matches previously but it didn’t really
show that much. Then Joelle started to look nervous for the first time
in the match as if she could suddenly see the finish line and a ticket
to the Weymuller finals. She played a handful of errors and things
started to get very tense. At 9-8 Joelle played a backhand crosscourt
drive than landed too short, but luckily for Joelle the ball found
itself going straight into the nick taking her to 10-8 match point! In
true fair Joelle style she apologized for the luck that was thrown her
way but she must have been relieved inside to get to her first match
point. The last point of the match was won by a stroke ( (11/9) and
taking Joelle to a 3-1 win.
A smiling Joelle said afterwards “I’m really, really happy to back in a
final of a big tournament and really enjoying being back in Brooklyn.
It’s just nice to enjoying the playing some good squash again. It’s
changes tomorrow as it goes back to be the hunter (rather than the
hunted). The Egyptians are always so nice to play against because they
play incentive squash. Here’s hoping that they play a five
setter!!”
The second semi final match was an all Egyptian affair with team mates
Nour El Sherbini world # 7 who is still only 19 years old against newly
crowned world #1 Raneem El Welily. Raneem recently took the #1 spot
from Malaysian squash legend, Nicol David, who has dominated for the
last 9 years.
As expected the match started off in true Egyptian style with both
players using the front of the court as often as possible. The points
stayed even most the way through the first game with Raneem reaching
game ball first. There were crazy and delightful rallies with
errors and amazing winners coming from both players throughout, but it
was Raneem that clinched the first in the end 13-11.
It really is so much fun to watch these players in action, their
creative squash and unpredictable choices kept us all on the edge of
our seats!
Even though Raneem won the first nail biting game she came back out on
court looking like she left her confidence in her racket bag. This was
not helped by the fact that Nour was on fire and couldn’t miss and was
playing freely and relaxed. An error ridden Raneem couldn’t stop Nour,
who maintained her amazing play and soon took the second 11/4.
The third game was more like the first with the points going to both
players evenly. The rallies were a little longer, they varied the pace
and Raneem looked to have regained some of her previously fallen
confidence. There was still a lot of back and forth with winners and
errors from both players but it certainly kept us all guessing who
would come through to take the crucial third game. At 8-8 Nour did an
amazing and very brave backhand cross court volley nick winner from a
good high lob from Raneem. This seemed to take the rug out from under
Raneem’s feet, as another error soon gave Nour the 2-1 lead winning the
third 11-9.
The fourth game as completely one sided with Nour blasting through the
game with winners and control and Raneem looked like she nothing left
to throw at the match. Nour took an extensive 9-1 lead and Raneem’s
last ditch attempt to get back some rhythm was pushed aside by Nour and
she went on to take the match 11/5 in the fourth.
A delighted Nour said after her huge win “I’m really really happy I won. She’s my model in squash.
Raneem has a lot of skills and is really fast and she deserves to be
world #1. I’m really, really happy to win this match as last time I
played her was 3 years ago at the Weymuller in this very court and I
lost 3-1! Joelle has just come from an injury and it’s great to see her
competing as before. Hopefully it’s going to be a nice match. I’ll try
to relax and forget about today and remember that there’s one more
match to go!”
Congratulations to both winners who played absolutely amazing squash
and we very much look forward to the final tomorrow between Joelle King
and Nour El Sherbini at 7.30pm. Please be at the Casino and seated at
7.30pm. Everyone is so excited to see who will be the 2015 Carol
Weymuller Champion. See you then!
Summary of today’s semi finals….
Joelle King beat Joshana Chinappa 11/4, 9/11, 11/4, 11/8.
Nour El Sherbini beat Raneem El Welily 11/13, 11/4, 11/9, 11/5.
