Coll causes huge upset in US Open
Top Kiwi men’s squash player Paul Coll has caused a huge upset in the first round the US Open in Philadelphia, posting one of the best wins of a career which continues to flourish.
The 25-year-old West Coastraised Cantabrian, who is ranked No 10 in the world, tipped up top seed and world No 2 Karim Abdel Gawad, of Egypt, 11-8, 11-3, 6-11, 11-8 in a stunning 74-minute display yesterday, in the first of the season’s PSA World
Series events.
With eight players seeded for the men’s tournament at Drexel University, Coll was handed a tough draw, but not much seems to matter for he man who has shot up the world’s pecking order in quick time, as he went on to produce another typically gritty display and stun his much more fancied opponent, who spent the month of May as the world’s topranked player.
‘‘It’s definitely one of the most significant wins of my career,’’ Coll said. ‘‘I’ve known for a long time that I’d be playing him and I prepared hard for it and set my game plan. I’ve been working really hard during the off-season and I’m cashing in and it’s going really well.’’
Coll has forged a reputation as one of the fittest and strongest athletes on tour, and played to that tune well, extending the rallies early on and forcing Gawad into an attritional battle that goes against the 26-year-old’s typical flair-based game.
‘‘I stuck to my game plan and trusted in what I was doing,’’ Coll said. ‘‘I knew he’d come out hard in the third [game] but I got back into it in the fourth and hit the right lines and length.’’
Coll now faces what would comparatively be looked at as a far easier challenge in the second round on Wednesday, against 29-year-old Egyptian Omar Mosaad, who is ranked at No 31, though who last year was at No 3 for a chunk of the year.
‘‘To beat someone like him [Gawad] in round one is huge,’’ Coll said. But I have to stay grounded. I can’t just be happy with that win, there’s plenty of squash left in this event and I want to go further.’’
Meanwhile in the women’s draw, there was mixed news for the Kiwis, with Joelle King easily advancing and Amanda Landersmurphy bowing out.
The women’s tournament features 16 seeds, and 11th-seeded world No 10 King comfortably took care of world No 41 Dutch qualifier Milou van der Heijden, 11-3, 13-11, 11-8.
There’s tough reward for the 29-year-old from Cambridge, though, as on Wednesday she now faces third seed and world No 2 Camille Serme, of France.
Landers-murphy, the world No 43 from Rotorua, came through qualifying and while she did well to take a game off world No 5 Nouran Gohar, the Egyptian wasn’t to be rolled, prevailing 11-2, 13-11, 4-11, 11-7.
The US Open carries US$165,000 prizemoney in each of the men’s and women’s draws and is the first of five events on the World Series, where points are earned to find the top eight players to compete at the World Series Finals in Dubai in June.