Elshorbagy, Matthew, Gaultier & Ashour Into El Gouna Quarters, Selby Wins Marathon by Nathan Clarke
photos PSA
7TH APR 2015
- Essex’s Daryl Selby starred as an English quartet marched into the
quarter-finals of the 2015 El Gouna International, PSA World Series
event taking place on Egypt’s Red Sea coastline.
Selby, who has fallen to World No.15 in the rankings, showed incredible
fighting spirit and desire to get the better of World No.5 Miguel Angel
Rodriguez, the ferociously fast Colombian who has flown up the rankings
so far in 2015, while Peter Barker, Nick Matthew and James Willstrop
also won to cap a successful day for English hopes.
Selby was forced to come from two-games-to-one down in order to prevail
against Rodriguez in a thrilling 105-minute encounter that earned him a
place against French World No.3 Gregory Gaultier in the last eight,
with the Frenchman the only non-English or Egyptian player left in the
tournament.
“I had really tough hard fought match yesterday against Nicolas Mueller and today was another really tough match,” said Selby.
“Miguel has improved so much recently and he’s fully deserving of being
a top 5 ranked player so for me that’s a big win as he is one of the
best players around at the moment.
“I’ve been playing better and better recently and I’m proving to myself
that I still have what it takes and that I can still play at the very
top level so today was very pleasing and I’m looking forward to coming
back tomorrow.”
Gaultier eased past Karim Abdel Gawad to book his place in the quarters
while the Egyptian trio of defending champion Ramy Ashour, World No.1
Mohamed Elshorbagy and World No.9 Omar Mosaad to give the home fans
plenty to cheer when the action resumes tomorrow (Wednesday April 8).
Ashour, who has missed the last four months through injury, was forced
to come from one-game down against talented compatriot Fares Dessouki
in order to keep his hopes of retaining the title alive.
“I was expecting him to come out fighting and I knew it would be tough,” said Ashour.
“He’s a very smart and explosive player and he’s hard to play but i
think I did well today and it’s just great to be back and to be
competing with all these amazing athletes on the tour.”
Draw:
Mohamed Elshorbagy (EGY) v [8] Peter Barker (ENG)
Omar Mosaad (EGY) v [3] Nick Matthew (ENG)
[4] Ramy Ashour (EGY) v James Willstrop (ENG)
Daryl Selby (ENG) v [2] Gregory Gaultier (FRA)
