Flying DAF academy spreads wings
El Dafrawy adds new venue in Festival City for community’s sake
A lot of her students were travelling from far afield and the traffic meant getting to and from Jumeirah was a bit of an issue.
While the UAE continues to grab the attention as the Middle East’s sporting capital — from football to UFC, F1 to cricket and even padel tennis — there is one sport that is flying a little under the radar but growing in popularity day on day.
Egyptian squash star Kanzy Emad El Dafrawy launched the nation’s first squash academy in May, and demand has been so high that she has already branched out and now has three venues aimed at reaching the next generation of talent in the region.
Kanzy — a former national champion in Egypt and the United States and former world No. 22 — is known as ‘The Flying DAF’ and has taken that name to brand her academy in Dubai.
Forced to give up on her dream of becoming the world No. 1 squash player when her time at the top was cut short by injury, Kanzy’s passion for squash never dimmed, and now she is actively paying it forward to kids across the UAE with her academy, backed by professional coaches.
After setting up in May in the Jumeirah community amid a stretch of beachfront hotels, with two venues at Jumeirah Beach Hotel and Jumeirah Mina A’Salam, allowing kids and aspiring players access to top-level coaching at five courts, Kanzy soon realised there was another issue — location, location, location.
A lot of her students were travelling from far afield and the Dubai traffic meant getting to and from Jumeirah was a bit of an issue.
After months of planning, she now has her third academy venue, which has been set up at Al Areesh Club in Festival City. “This sports club at Al Areesh was a perfect fit for us to expand,” she told